


Know I'm No Good

by smolhombre



Series: For You [1]
Category: Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (Movies), Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Character Study, F/F, F/M, Flawed Characters Trying Their Best, Gift Fic, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, J.R.R. Tolkien as a Flirting Medium, M/M, Past Relationship(s), Reluctant and Oblivious Sugar Baby, Slow Burn, Sugar Daddy, Tender loving care, Unreliable Narrator
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-07
Updated: 2017-06-29
Packaged: 2018-09-30 05:49:33
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 60,830
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10155359
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/smolhombre/pseuds/smolhombre
Summary: Modesty gets him the job, really. She pulls some puppy dog eyed bribery on Tina, who has an ex she still has to play nice with because Queenie dates their neighbor or something equally convoluted who needs a receptionist at their clinic.*Credence takes the job because he needs it. It becomes something else soon after, and for the life of him he can't figure out who to blame for it.





	1. Part One

**Author's Note:**

> See the end notes for content warnings. If you're into playlists, [here's one](https://open.spotify.com/user/kddavis1121/playlist/4p0wifSQG6CyfcxERKCoMG) just for you to get you in the mood while you read. Enjoy!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> See end notes for Content Warnings

**I.**

Modesty gets him the job, really. She pulls some puppy dog eyed bribery on Tina, who has an ex she still has to play nice with because Queenie dates their neighbor or something equally convoluted who needs a receptionist at their clinic.

And Tina must have dirt on Newt Scamander that Credence can’t even begin to imagine, because despite showing up to the sham of an interview seven minutes late, possessing no people skills -- bordering on being actively repellent -- and having no feelings, positive or negative, towards animals (though they regularly showed, across the board, an innate dislike for him), he has a job for the first time in six months within five minutes of shaking the man’s freckled hand, which is basically one big callous from wrist to fingertip.

Newt hardly looks at him for longer than five seconds at a time while Credence makes his stuttering introduction.

“Yes, I know,” Newt waves him off not unkindly, peering into a cage with a large green and orange bird flapping inside irately. “Now, throwing a tantrum won’t get you anymore treats, Beatrice. You know I’m onto your tricks and I’ve given you three extra already. Tina’s told me about you, she talked about your family quite a bit.”

It takes a moment for Credence to realize he’s speaking to him and not the bird with the lack of transition or change in tone.

“I’m sorry,” he says reflexively. Newt’s fluffy brow furrows and he turns away from the now squawking bird.

“Nothing to be sorry for, is there?”

“What?”

Newt’s eyes are a very odd shade of blue, Credence thinks, and they peer up the few inches of height he has on him like a summer raincloud or dishwater left stagnant. Very odd, and very intent.

“I’ll have you come in at nine every day but Tuesdays and Thursdays; we start at eight then, those are surgery days. We accept our last patients at six and don’t close till they are all seen. Saturday we’re open until two, closed on Sunday. Do you have any allergies?”

Credence’s head spins, whirring like the row of occupied hamster wheels to his right.

“Can -- can I write this down, please?”

Newt blinks, then starts like a bucket of ice water over his curly head. 

“Of course! I’m so sorry, I get ahead of myself. Do you even want the job? Where’s my steno pad --”

Suddenly, a half-chewed to death ballpoint and a stack of neon pink post-it notes are in his fumbling hands.

“Thank you -- alright, nine except when it’s eight. Closed Sundays...what else? Allergies? Does that -- does that matter?”

“Well I won’t have you handling anything you’re allergic to. I won’t be paying you enough for that.”

His grin is lopsided, affable, and Credence realizes on some level it’s in jest, but on the off chance it isn’t, he has to ask.

“I have to...handle...them?”

“This is a vet,” Newt says slowly, his grin fading.

“I thought Modesty said this was a receptionist job.” His chest and throat are unbearably hot.

“Well yes, I do need you to do that. But I may have you weigh them or...or nothing, I suppose. We have techs of course, but we usually all work together.” Finally, Newt seems to look uncomfortable the way most people do around him. He needs this job, has to recover somehow; but he can’t agree to touch the animals, he doesn’t have it in him. 

“I’m no good with them,” He begins, stilted. “It will upset them more than anything.”

Newt's face is soft, considering.

“Well I’m sure you aren’t so bad. Why would you want to work here otherwise?”

Credence barely bites the words back, rolls them around his tongue till they rattle in his skull.

He tries for a smile, but the frozen expression on Newt’s face tells him he’s missed the mark. Newt has him fill out a stack of paperwork that’s been highlighted and annotated in loopy handwriting with enough detail Credence knows someone else prepared this for him in as much silence as a full veterinary clinic allows, and after a perfunctory handshake Credence makes his hasty retreat.

“I’ll see you tomorrow at nine.”

Newt’s grip on his hand tightens, the roughness there especially grating in his desperation to leave; it feels like an extra set of cage bars trapping him in.

“It’s Tuesday tomorrow. Eight, remember?”

He’ll be fired before the end of the week.

“Yes.” He jerks his hand back harder than he has to right as Newt loosens his grip anyway, and grimaces at how it must look. “I’m sorry.”

He bolts.

*

“I’m glad to see you,” Newt smiles. Credence stumbles on the linoleum; no one has ever said that to him before.

“Did you think I wouldn’t show up?”

“Not without a phone call. I trust your sense of honor that much.”

Credence frowns. That doesn’t make sense. “You’ve known me for twenty minutes.”

“...Human decency, then.”

The desk is a big semi-circle, and Newt is propped up on the back of a comfortable, if worn, looking rolling chair behind it with a cup of coffee in one hand. 

“I might not have.” He admits, looking over the two computers, phones, and various office detritus while trying to not get overwhelmed.

“Right,” Newt says loudly after a big gulp of coffee. “Tara will show you through the computer system when she gets back in from walking Drippy; I’m afraid I’m not familiar enough to teach you myself. She’ll set you up with your account and show you how to use the printer -- it can be finicky, apparently. Just answer the calls as they come in and ask Tara if there’s any question you don’t know the answer to. The files are back here,” he leads to the hallway behind the desk, filled floor to ceiling with rows of patient files.

“When they come in, grab their file and check them in the system. You can hang it outside the room for me when you’re all done.”

“But not till your surgeries are done,” Credence confirms slowly. Newt’s eyes are bright, crinkling up at the corners as he smiles at him. If the lines are from age or sun-damage, Credence can’t be sure.

“Yes, very good.” Newt visibly debates patting him on the shoulder, finally does so hurriedly. “You’re going to do very well.”

Credence face flushes with red, splotchy heat. Now he has an expectation to do something besides mess up. He’s given Mr. Newt a false impression that he can -- 

“Are you the new guy?”

A willowy woman with ashy brown hair pulled into a sloppy bun flops into one of the desk chairs and gives him an assessing look. Credence is comforted seeing the familiar reservation in it.

“Tara, this is Credence. Credence this is Tara, she keeps the place open and running.”

“This is Drippy,” she says instead of reaching over to take his hand or asking him about himself, which he’s more than grateful for. A great, fat, minky brown cat with a vacant expression on it’s smooshed in face is placed on the counter. It takes a half step towards him before flopping onto its side, rolling in the papers and pens there carelessly.

“You...walk your cat?” He asks slowly, eyeing the purple harness snug to its middle.

“Drippy needs exercise,” Tara says testily. “Especially considering some members of our clinic overfeed her.” She finishes in a mutter under her breath.

Newt rolls his eyes, which looks strange. Credence thinks his face is built for sincerity, the exasperation there looks like a too tight coat.

“...Does it stay here?”

“Drippy stays at the clinic, yes. She entertains patients and keeps the mice away.” Newt says. “She won’t bother you.”

Tara frowns at him.

“Do you not like cats?” 

“I don’t know what to do with them,” he blurts before he really thinks it through.

Whatever Newt and Tara are about to say gets cut off by the merry jingle of the front door opening. A small woman with a head full of beautiful, swinging curls leads a massive, loping St. Bernard into the lobby; Drippy gives a protesting mewl when Tara leans over the desk to coo at the newcomer.

“Is that my baby Molasses?”

Credence only realizes he’s taken a step back and is half behind Newt after he’s done it. Newt looks at him from the corner of his eye, mouth a little tight.

“He’s here for his little snip-snip, pet him now while he still likes you,” the owner jokes.

“He’ll be so out of it after he won’t know we’re responsible. It’s you he’ll be mad at.” Tara continues cooing, walking around to scratch behind it’s flopping ears.

“Go grab Asja Jackson’s file from the back, please,” Newt says around the tight grip on his coffee cup, and Credence falls over himself to comply, especially as Molasses moves to inspect behind the counter, huge tail swooshing audibly in excitement. Newt and Tara are crouched in front of the dog when he comes back after a few moment’s clumsy searching, with Drippy winding around Molasses’ thick legs. Newt looks up as he re-enters, straightening and downing the rest of his drink. 

“I’ll walk him to exam three. Credence, Tara will show you how to log everything. Asja, you can come by anytime after five and he should be awake enough to take home.”

He’s trying to sit discreetly in one of the rolling chairs when Molasses presses his cold, wet nose against Credence’s hand, and the thought of being so close to the teeth he knows rest behind the drooling jowls makes him leap back with a cry, half falling out of the chair altogether. 

There’s a ringing silence as he tries to right himself, ears and neck unbearably hot. Even Molasses and Drippy seem preternaturally quiet. 

“I’m s --”

“Well, let’s get him nice and sleepy, shall we? Tara, why don’t you take Asja and Molasses back.” Newt tosses his coffee in the trash can at the edge of the desk and Credence can’t keep from flinching, though the action is a magnet for Tara’s curious, guarded gaze. She takes Molasses’ leash in no particular hurry, and Asja barely gives him a wincing smile before following her to the exam room.

“Credence,” Newt begins softly, and yes, he expected to get fired quickly, but not this quickly.

“Mr. Newt, I’m sorry --”

“Are you alright?”

“I -- I’m what?”

Newt drums his fingers on the countertop, visibly chewing the inside of his cheek.

“Newt?” Tara’s voice filters from the exam room at the other end of the waiting area.

“I need to get started so we don’t get too far behind schedule.” A pause. “Will you give me the file please?”

Credence looks down to where it’s crumpled in his left hand, and the realization he’s still holding onto it sears like a burn into his palm. 

“Yes, sorry, I’m --”

“It’s really quite alright.” Newt says as he takes the folder from Credence’s limp grip and strides away without another word.

He won’t cry on his first day. Won’t. 

*

They break for lunch at one after a slow morning, which is a stroke of luck Credence can’t quite believe. Tara takes him to the back room where a microwave and mini fridge sit on a sagging folding table. He likes that she isn’t trying too hard to pretend to be his friend, and when they finally cross into the room she reaches into the fridge to put something in the microwave wordlessly. 

He hadn’t packed anything for lunch; is still not used to eating more than once a day, even now. There’s a pack of crackers in a plastic bowl on the round, stilted table across from the microwave and even if he waits to grab it until her back is turned out of habit, he does take them in hopes it will lessen the awkwardness as they stand at opposite ends of the room watching each other. At least it gives him the pretense of something to do. 

Tara cradles the warm tupperware in her hands and eats it while propped on the table, looking him over unabashedly. He tries to nibble on a cracker and ignore her. He only gets one and a half down before his throat is unbearably thick and dry and he resorts to counting tiles on the floor. 

At thirty-seven, Newt walks in, looking ruffled.

“Should two hamsters cause one man so much suffering?” He asks to no one in particular as he beelines for the refrigerator.

“Don’t know why you’re looking in there,” Tara says primly. “You didn’t bring anything for lunch today. Again.”

Newt frowns, looking up at her like he’s still puzzling together what she said.

“Suppose I didn’t, did I?”

The crackers in his sweaty palm feel Atlean.

“Uhm. Mr. Newt, you can have --”

Tara snorts around the last bite of her lunch. 

“Mr. Newt? You make him call you Mr. Newt?”

“Just Newt is fine,” he tells Credence with an exasperated look over to Tara, who whistles as she rinses her bowl in the sink.

“You can have these.” He holds them out, focusing on keeping his arm steady. “I took -- they’re yours anyway.”

Newt takes them after peering at his face as if searching for something specific. Credence looks away, gritting his teeth. He’s admitted to stealing already, Newt should fire him for that alone; what’s to say he doesn’t go in the cash box next?

“Thank you for sharing these. Low blood sugar you know,” Newt hums before taking a few crackers and trying to pass them back. Credence shakes his head.

“No. I’m sorry for taking them in the first place. I wasn’t thinking.”

“...Aren’t you hungry?”

“I don’t usually eat before dinner.” 

Credence has known plenty of people who don’t even eat once a day, and can’t really understand the looks Tara and Newt focus on him. He’s clearly not starving. What does it matter to them if he eats now or not?

An indignant mewl sounds down the hall and Credence stiffens, more focused now on Drippy than the misplaced concern of his employers. Tara sighs.

“Little shit wants treats. I’ll handle it.”

“It would make me feel better if you ate,” Newt tries again, still holding the crackers out. “I know I feel better having eaten.” 

“I can’t.” Credence’s back is superglued to the wall behind him, palms pressed flat against the painted surface. “Please.”

Newt freezes, and Credence has seen fear enough -- (in his sisters, in the mirror, in the furtive glances that followed him in the grocery store) -- to recognize it on Newt’s face now.

“I’m -- I’m very sorry, Credence. I wasn’t trying to push you.”

Newt takes a few backwards steps away from him, his voice very even. 

“I can’t eat it,” Credence repeats as if it explains anything. 

“It’s alright.” 

He realizes Newt is talking to him like a spooked horse, but it’s not like he can do anything about it. He holds Newt’s gaze until the other man turns away, shoving a cracker in his mouth. He never keeps his back fully exposed to Credence.

*

The next four days aren’t exactly easy, but he doesn’t cry at all or have a meltdown and he might actually learn how to do a few things in the process even if he leaves every day bone-tired and unhappy. Tara walks him through his basic administrative duties with cool, dispassionate professionalism even when he messes up, which is usually when he has to interact with another human instead of the computer. He is, as it turns out, the only one the printer “likes,” and Tara might seem a little pleased by that but he can’t be sure. The files are easy enough to navigate, and the rotating cast of techs all mostly stick to themselves -- they all came as a group from the technical college on the other side of town, and when they aren’t with the animals they’re in the lab, where Newt seemingly grants them free reign. 

Perhaps that’s what surprises Credence the most: Newt has a strange detachment to the clinic and the people in it, by and large. He clearly enjoys working with the pets people brought in -- Credence learns Newt is the only exotic animals vet in the tri-state with some impossibly specific certification, so they see more than their fair share of overprotective pygmy goat and opossum owners -- but was uninterested in the clinic itself as far as how it was run and, apparently, who was in it. (Perhaps he should be more grateful about it; clearly it’s the only reason he himself was hired).

Besides Tara and Credence himself, likely only by virtue of being the only other man in the place, Newt can’t be bothered to get the names of the techs straight, or pay more than passing attention to their incessant questions and hovering. He was happy to let them giggle and knock things over in the lab and apparently use all his supplies for practice, much to Tara’s displeasure, so long as it left him free to make house visits for horses and sheep and kept them from shadowing him too much. Moreover, while Tara and the other techs coddled and cooed at the pets, Newt was never particularly sweet with them. Aside from an occasional pat or scratch behind the ears, he often didn’t touch or speak at them at all.

Credence supposes he had always assumed a veterinarian would be more like Tara, who went out of her way to play with the pets as they came in -- and maybe that’s why, sitting now in the room that was only nominally an office, Credence can’t keep himself from asking:

“Do you not think they’re cute?”

The door to the hall is still open behind him, opposite the deep, rosy pink of nightfall falling into a silky purple in the window that frames Newt’s hunched shoulders. Credence watches him glance once to the open doorway before looking back.

“Pardon?”

Newt’s accent is crisp in the morning, but more of a drawl the further he gets from his coffee. Now the word sounds heavy, lands like an anchor in Credence’s lap.

“The animals,” he clarifies in a mumble. “You don’t really...I don’t know. Never mind.” Credence has tried his best to limit “I’m sorry” in his vocabulary since working here; it clearly bothers Newt.

Newt caps his pen slowly. “I do think they’re cute.”

Credence taps his fingers on his leg -- the chair he’s in is so low his knees are practically up by his chin, though he tries to sit as straight as possible. Newt had asked him to stay as Tara and the technician that drew the short straw to do final rounds had collected their bags and left without a backwards glance. After leading him back, though, Newt had started on some paperwork sitting on the desk and hadn’t deigned to speak again.

“How was your first week?”

“...Shouldn’t I be asking you?”

Newt blinks at him like Credence has given him a rubik's cube, rather than asked a reasonable question.

“I’m asking about how you’re feeling about it, Credence. I’m not trying to trick you into saying anything.” 

He doesn't really even sound defensive, so Credence nibbles the inside of his cheek before replying.

“I am glad nothing bit me.”

Newt’s laugh is more breathy exhale than giggle, but there’s real mirth in it, echoed in the crinkles that are thrown into sharp relief around his eyes. He has faint lines in parentheses bracketing his mouth, now that Credence is looking -- how old was he, anyway?

“I am glad about that myself.” 

The night is full, indigo dark when Newt speaks again, stacking the papers at the corner of the desk with a final, flourished signature. 

“I suppose I just wanted to make sure you weren’t totally miserable. I maybe should have lead with that -- I hope you didn’t think I brought you back to fire you or something silly.”

Credence winces, and Newt’s mouth tightens in a puckered frown.

“Well, let’s get you home before I do anything else that makes you want to quit.”

He’s let Modesty wear the coat today, since she had a field trip at school, so he waits as Newt collects his own sweatshirt -- grey, with “Royal Veterinary College” emblazoned on the front, and a strange crest on the back with seemingly every animal that crammed its way onto Noah’s Ark -- and walks beside him in silence to the front door, where he locks up before giving Credence a surprised once over.

“Did you forget your jacket?”

“No.”

“Aren’t you cold?”

Credence shrugs.

“Do you -- do you have to walk home just in that?”

“Just to the bus stop,” Credence replies gruffly. He smooths the front of his borrowed shirt self consciously. Modesty had to stay up half the night baking for their neighbor to get his cast offs, since he needed office clothes to start working here. It’s not just anything.

“I could give you a ride,” Newt offers slowly after a long moment’s pause. Credence’s chest tightens. 

“No.”

To Credence’s relief, Newt visibly bites back a protest or another offer.

“If you’re sure,” he says evenly, unlocking the front door to his grey sedan. “I’ll see you Monday. Get home safe.” 

“Yes, sir.” 

It’s dark out; the nearest street light is yards away, and the weak orange light it filters across the parking lot isn’t enough to get a great read on Newt’s expression -- but Credence probably couldn’t really reason the frown he sees there anyway.

Newt passes him at the mouth of the lot, and peels off in the same direction as the bus stop. Credence follows the gleam of his sluggish taillights for two miles, hands buried in his pockets. He’s missed the bus he usually takes home, and curls into the bench and himself as much as he can for the forty minute wait for the next one. If the taillights linger for a moment at the stop sign, he doesn't notice.

**II.**

It’s two and a half weeks before Credence has his first dream. Modesty is in the running shower across the hall as he wakes, rolling his hips languidly into the mattress. In the bleary space between wakefulness and sleep, Credence chases the drag of the sheets underneath him mindlessly, sweet friction building low and spreading a delicious tingle in his belly, the tops of his thighs, the budding ache in his groin.

The water turns off, and like a switch Credence is flat on his back, gasping. By the time his sister shuts the bathroom door, her feet squeaking on the thin carpet in the hallway, Credence is up and shoving a pair of jeans on. He’s searching for a shirt and shivering at the cold air drafting in their little apartment on his bare chest and shoulders when she steps in.

“Can you wear those to work?”

“Dry your hair properly, at least,” Credence mutters instead of answering, grabbing the towel from her hands to scrub it over her dripping hair. 

“I washed your good pants last night and laid them out, they should be dry by now.” 

“I think I’m getting my scrubs today.”

Modesty blinks at him, and her eyelashes are as wet as the hair on her head -- she never takes the time to towel off properly; he’s sure the floor outside is sopping wet as well.

“You’re kidding.”

“Everyone else wears them. A different color every day.”

“...Well if you want to keep the clothes Mr. Hester gave you we can put them up somewhere. If you don’t need them anymore I can use that space in the closet for some things Tina wants to give me.”

Credence shrugs, not really caring where his clothes were kept.

“She wants to come over, by the way. For dinner or something.”

He deflates like a popped balloon. 

“She picked me up from school yesterday --”

“Isn’t that _nice_ ,” he mutters.

“-- and asked if there was a time she could come by. She can bring whatever we want, she said.”

Credence chews the inside of his cheek, half wanting to pop the delicate skin like blister between his teeth.

“We can’t go over to her place?”

Modesty frowns over her shoulder at him where she’s rifling through the closet.

“Credence,” she sighs. “She’s been good to us --”

“Whatever you want,” he butts in, heading to the bathroom to shave and brush his teeth. If he’s more unsociable than usual when he gets to work, Tara doesn’t mention it. 

Newt, however, is a different story as usual.

They’ve taken to “eating lunch” in the back office, since Credence never brought anything and Newt barely remembered most days himself. This kept Tara from nagging at them, since she stayed in the break room and talked to her girlfriend or watched YouTube on her phone while she ate. They only talk sometimes, which Credence likes. He still bothers Credence about eating, especially when he takes the initiative to order something for himself, but Credence has learned to tune it out. Newt sometimes doesn’t ask him how his day is going at all, when he’s got a lot of paperwork or charts to do, and the half hour of silence he gets to enjoy is the best part of his day. It’s not all good, of course. There are silences after Newt’s had to put something down which leave Credence well and truly lost for what to do or say. But overall, Newt doesn’t seem to expect that much of Credence, and Credence tries to remember that when he feels Newt’s prodding grate at him. Like now. 

“Are you doing alright today, Credence?”

“Yes.”

Newt smiles at him over the chart open on his desk at Credence’s obvious lie.

“That good, hm?”

He frowns at the back of his hand for a moment, studying a dry patch on his knuckle. 

“You knew Tina, didn’t you?”

“Mm? You know I did.” He pauses, looking up from his papers with a frown. “Is -- is she alright, then? What has you asking?”

“...Nothing. I’m sorry. Modesty just mentioned her this morning.”

“Oh. Oh, yes. She and Tina are close, aren’t they? I remember she talked about her a lot.” Newt scrunched his face up, scrounging for something. “Didn’t she want to be a copper when she grew up?”

Credence blinks at him owlishly. “You remember that?”

“Tina was quite proud of her.”

He hums noncommittally. She was, of course. He was, too. But Tina’s pride did not extend to Credence, only her pity. Only her disappointment, weighted all the heavier with her good intentions that made it worse that That Woman’s, fueled by disgust.

“I’m sorry if she talked about her too much.”

Newt laughs at that. “She talked my ear off about a lot, as you can imagine. If it was about Modesty instead of the horrorshow she saw at her job or how useless CPS was I was having a good day.”

Credence tries to grin at him. Newt must have forgotten he and Modesty themselves were once one of Tina’s cases. There’s something wistful about how Newt is talking about her that Credence can’t really understand, though.

... _Oh_.

His brow knots under the weight of his stupid idea. “She wants to come over for dinner,” he says slowly.

“...That’s nice?”

“Do you want to come?” _And distract her so I don’t have to talk to her all night?_

Newt leans back in his chair, brows up at his hairline.

“I...what?”

Credence wants to sink into the floor and never reappear again, hot at the back of his neck.

“I’m sorry. That was stupid. I am -- dumb. You don’t need to. I don’t even want you t --”

“Credence, Credence. It’s alright. I would...not mind at all.”

“You wouldn’t?”

Newt is a bit pink on the ears, but that could be the light.

*

The problem, of course, is that he has invited his boss to dinner. To his house. With himself. With his sister. And with his boss’ ex-girlfriend, their former case worker. 

“You’re bringing a _date_?”

“My boss is not my date, Modesty.” He sighs, rubbing a hand over his face. He’s sat at the kitchen table, half reading their worn copy of _The Hobbit_ while she stirs their Easy-Mac in her housecoat and slippers. They were to date the nicest gift she’s ever received; a satin matching pair from Queenie and Jacob two years prior for her birthday. 

“I mean he’s not Tina’s date, he’s not my date. Someone invited him and that would be you, by process of elimination.”

“I brought him to avoid talking to Tina.” He says flatly. 

Her mouth purses as she ladles out the bowls. “I don’t like how you hate her.”

“I don’t hate her. I just don’t like her.”

“ _Credence_. What’s the difference, with you?”

“I can’t help it.”

Modesty places the bowl on the table, sliding the book out of the way. “I know you can’t.”

“I don’t want you to keep trying to make us be friends. She likes you, that’s fine. Leave me out of it.”

“She likes you too, Credence,” she huffs in exasperation.

“She _pities_ me.”

Modesty is silent chewing her food, and Credence enjoys the little victory he has around his own mouthful. Modesty leaves him to do the dishes in silence -- sullen as usual after losing an argument, he doesn’t have the faintest idea where she gets it from -- and is asleep once he retreats to the bedroom after drying them and finishing “Queer Lodgings.”

The dreams come again this time, more vivid tonight than the one before. There are shapes and figures discernible now, where it was just a feeling he chased before. Hands card through his hair, a thumb brushing the soft skin of his orbital bone, down the bridge of his nose, the bow of his lip. Lips follow, the glide of teeth on the side of his neck, balmed over by the warm slip of a tongue, and he lets himself be guided to his knees, looking up through his lashes, blissfully dopey at --

_Newt._

2:30 a.m. is sweat-sticky and uncomfortably quiet as he wakes. Modesty continues to snore quietly in the bed opposite, and though he tries to copy her, clammy and breathing heavily, it does nothing for his dick, insistent for attention.

After a moment, he peels the sheets off and plods down the hall as silently as he is capable, shame hot at his ears. He hasn’t had to do this since he was Modesty’s age himself. He shuts the bathroom door and sits on the closed toilet lid, suddenly at a loss with his hand half down his pajama pants. This was always the hardest part. 

What was the dream about? Eyes half shut, he imagines he feel of lips at his throat, making their way lower. That was a good part. What else was good? Being led to kneel, hands cupping his face, thumbs stroking the line of his jaw, gliding at his mouth -- in his mouth, heavy on his tongue. The grip he has on himself tightens, and Credence bits back a grunt.

Yes, that was good. Steady, sure hands -- _that belong to Newt._

He releases his hand as if burned, breathing heavily through his nose. 

*

Work is more painful than usual for the rest of the week. Credence walks around waiting for Newt to reprimand him for his dream, certain that the other man has found out in some way.

Credence has dreamed of men before, of course, but even out of That Woman’s house he doesn’t like to dwell on it. The fact that it’s his boss, that it’s Newt, is almost more upsetting. He can’t afford to mess this job up, and he won’t let his dick ruin it.

“Credence?” Tara taps her fingers on the back of his chair. He looks up at her from his computer screen dumbly. 

“Will you take these back to Newt? It’s payroll, he’s got to sign off on it.” 

“Sure.” Anything to get away from Drippy, who’s come in from sunbathing and is inching to her favorite perch on the desk, too near for Credence’s comfort. She’s been growing gradually more interested in him the longer he works here, to Credence’s displeasure. It’s not endeared him to Tara, as every apparent affront to the cat is one to her as well.

He flips through the papers idly as he walks back, stopping short at the doorway to the back office.

“Credence?”

He blinks up at Newt, sitting at his desk and looking particularly rumpled. He’d had to wrestle a goat or something this morning on a house call, and a shiner blooms yellow and purple at his temple.

“This is a lot of money.”

“Pardon?”

He should just shut up and take it. But what if this is some test? He clears his throat before speaking again, to the corner of the desk rather than to Newt himself.

“This looks like more than we agreed on, is all.”

Newt sticks his hand out, and Credence hands him the papers to look over. He might imagine Newt fidgeting as he looks the forms over longer than necessary before speaking. 

“Well, this is for overtime, Credence.” 

He frowns. “I haven’t worked any overtime.”

Newt visibly bites the inside of his cheek, expression frozen as Credence puts the pieces together.

“Mr. Newt...I don’t need your--” Money? He did. But he wouldn’t take his charity like this. “I didn’t earn that money.”

He forces himself to look at a point on Newt’s stubbled jaw, since he can’t quite make himself meet his eyes. There’s a scar there, cutting diagonally across his chin onto the swell of his bottom lip. Newt props his head on one hand as he studies Credence and it stops him from thinking about his mouth too much, thankfully. Last night he dreamt it stretched around the width of him, and even if the rest of Newt’s face was smudged around the edges like some impressionist painting his mouth was hot velvet, which is what he approximates that sort of thing would feel like. A Very Good Thing.

Credence doesn’t understand why the dreams focus on Newt, aside from the fact that he’s just the first person on his mind outside of his family for his dick to latch onto, now that he’s forced to socialize.

(--And while it’s true that he’s never had these dreams about his other bosses, Credence reasons that it’s likely because Newt is the first boss Credence has felt anything other than outright contempt and mistrust for. It’s unsurprising, really; Newt is the only one yet to have experience handling wild animals and beasts).

“You are still afraid of the pets we see,” Newt begins slowly. It’s silent for a minute before Credence realizes it was a question.

“Yes.” He sees no reason to lie.

“But you come in either way. You never complain about being asked to do things I know scare you.”

“That’s just doing my job.” Credence shifts uncomfortably as Newt closes the office door, perching on the edge of the desk with his arms crossed over his chest. His knees brush the tops of Credence’s thighs, just barely, and he looks up at Credence in a way that’s assessing in real life, but Credence can only see in the same smudgy way they were in the dream, fluttering closed, lashes dusting his cheek.

“Look, I want to compensate you for your work. I -- I spoke to Tina, the other day, after you and I had lunch, and…”

There’s a ringing in Credence’s ears like standing in a bell tower, a rush like being enveloped in a great whooshing tide.

“I’m not one of her cases anymore.”

Newt starts. “I spoke to her as a friend, Credence. My friend, and yours. Not as a social worker.” 

“Friends don’t go between them and their boss, they don’t...renegotiate wages.”

“She didn’t! She didn’t. I did, myself.” He pauses. “I thought you would be happy about it.”

“Did you?”

“...She mentioned you might be resistant. But I know you support your house alone, Credence, and you help Tara out a lot up front --”

“You know I don’t --”

“Credence.”

He’s never heard Newt speak that way before, and he’s seen the man with his hand clamped between the teeth of four animals illegal in three states. Authoritative. Final. Stern.

Credence bows his head reflexively. 

“Do you trust me to run my own clinic?”

“I -- yes.”

“Does that not mean arranging the salaries of my employees to my discretion?”

He swallows thickly.

“Yes, sir.”

Newt pushes up from the desk after a moment’s hesitation, and slowly brings his hands up to rest on Credence’s hunched shoulders.

“Credence, can you look at me?”

He sees Newt raise his hand in slow motion, joints locking into place as muscle memory takes over, stiffening the line of his spine. Newt’s hand is nudging his face up by the chin by the time Credence stops trying to curl into himself and he realizes he isn’t being hit. 

“I…” Newt is looking at him oddly, and Credence frantically tries to place the expression somewhere in his memory for a clue how to react, but can’t recall a single person looking at him like this before. 

He drops his hand, and Credence lets out a shaky breath.

“I’m sorry.”

“You don’t have anything to apologize for, Credence,” Newt says gruffly, dropping his hands and walking back behind the desk. “I would like you to accept the pay raise. If you truly can’t accept it, I won’t understand but I won’t -- I won’t make you, either.”

Credence stares at the papers in front of him. Modesty’s birthday is coming up right after the New Year, and he may be able to get her something, for once, she actually likes. Maybe something that he won’t wait to give her until after Tina leaves. 

“If,” he clears his throat. “If you’re sure.”

The line of Newt’s shoulders relaxes immediately, like he’s the one that’s been done a favor. 

"Yes, Credence. I’m quite sure.”

**III.**

The third time Credence changes his shirt, he doesn’t even attempt to hide it from Modesty.

“You need to calm down.”

“I am calm,” he tells her evenly. If he is or isn’t (and, truly, he isn’t) it doesn’t really matter, because he’s able to mask it either way by speaking and moving slowly, flat as paper. His final shirt choice also helps, like a piece of armor by itself. The button-down is the nicest color of anything he owns, objectively; a rich, forest green in good enough shape that it almost hides how big it is around his middle, even if it’s close to fitting his shoulders. 

“You scrubbed the toilet twice since being home.” 

“Because you didn’t earlier in the week like we agreed.”

“You’ve changed your shirt three times.”

“How many times do you change before school?”

She falls onto her bed, propped on her elbows, and eyes him critically.

“You want to impress Tina now that she got you a raise?”

Credence feels himself tense, and it gives him away. Modesty’s smirk bisects her face like a Cheshire Cat, and Credence swallows something thick and heavy that’s lodged itself in his throat. _Now that_ Tina _got him a raise?_

“What did you say?”

“She said your boss-man called about giving you a raise. Does that convince you not to hate her now?”

“Do -- do you two ever talk about anything that’s not me?” Modesty jerks back with a frown when he turns to her.

“Now you want to know about my period or something?” She snarls. “Don’t bite my head off because she cares about you.”

Sometimes, Credence gets a warning before he snaps. Sometimes he feels himself balloon underneath his skin, more feeling than flesh and bone, more beast than his body can hold. Sometimes he thinks he feels the stretching protest of flesh trying to accommodate the rushing of whatever it is that shoves him out of his body and wears his skin like Credence is the real interloper. Sometimes, but not this time.

“Fuck you."

Modesty shoots off the bed like a bottle rocket, but Credence is already reaching for the dresser, pulling it down between them. Modesty yelps as it catches her foot underneath, and Credence doesn’t even stop to help. He kicks at the fallen furniture, pushing it and Modesty both back on the bed with a snarl, before stalking out into the hallway, kicking at the doorway as he goes.

He’s too big for this apartment, for this building. Yanking the door open so hard the hinges protest, he nearly topples over Tina. Her skinny hands fly up reflexively, and he grabs at her wrists, walking her backwards until she’s pressed against the railing.

“Oh! Oh, my goodness. Credence, can you hear me?” Her neck is splotchy and her eyes are blown wide and black, but her voice is even when she finally seems to make herself speak. “I need you to let me go.”

“Why do you _always_ \--”

“Credence!” 

Newt charges up the stairs, almost breathless and scowling. “What is this?”

Credence drops his hands to his sides limply, the strings of blind rage that kept him upright and moving cut abruptly by Newt’s presence, leaving him only to drop. 

Tina squeezes from between his immobile body and the railing, trying to stop Newt as he pushes forward.

“Newt, you need to give him space now --”

He ignores her, and each step forward solidifies the nausea in Credence’s stomach that accompanies his descent back into his body.

Credence is taller than Newt by several inches, but though his body was built for the possibility of broadness, if the width of his shoulders and the size of his hands and feet were anything to go by, Newt’s solid body was actually filled out with age and activity. He stands so close their chests nearly brush and Credence feels very small. He feels manageable. So soon after feeling massive and out of control, the difference is jarring.

“Credence? I asked you what happened here.”

“I...m sorry.” He croaks, eyes trained on Newt’s shoes. Proper loafers, not the sneakers he wore to work. Proper loafers that match the proper trousers and dress shirt only a few shades off from Credence’s own.

Inside, Modesty groans, and Tina moves into the house so quickly it’s like she’s being sucked in by a black hole. Newt’s expression grows tight.

“I didn’t hurt her. I wouldn’t.”

He eyes Credence critically. “I think you may have, Credence, even if you didn’t mean to.”

“Please don’t fire me.”

Slowly, Newt raises his hand to grip the back of Credence’s neck. He shudders, but if it’s into or under the touch he can’t be sure.

“I wasn’t going to. I’d like to think this isn’t your normal behavior, so please tell me what happened. I don’t want to keep asking, especially if it upsets you.”

He doesn’t deserve the consideration Newt gives him to care if he’s upset or not.

“We fought. I knocked a dresser over and tried to leave,” he says woodenly. “I ran into Tina on the way out.”

The thumb at the nape of his neck rubs a soft arc where his hair is buzzed short. His eyes flutter shut, and Newt’s mouth parts as he studies him. Credence blinks to shake that observation free, to forget he even noticed his mouth at all.

“You didn’t want dinner to begin with, is that right?”

“I’m sorry,” Credence affirms miserably.

“Your nerves were bad. I understand. But you need to apologize, alright?”

Tina and Modesty hobble to the doorway. Modesty’s eyes are red, and her face is streaked with eyeliner that dried alongside the obvious tear-tracks on her flushed cheeks. Newt releases his hold warily, and Credence steps forward, looking between his sister and Tina. 

Modesty takes a stumbling step forward and Credence swoops down to grab her, wrapping her in a hug tight enough to keep him glued to earth if only by his arms around her bony body.

Tina relaxes in the doorway, and Credence pretends she isn’t there. 

*

Newt kneels on their kitchen floor to check Modesty’s ankle. It’s swelling and already starting to bruise, but he pats her knee and says unless she has trouble bearing weight on it tomorrow morning he doesn’t think it’s sprained or broken. Tina straightens the dresser and bedroom while Credence sits cross-legged on the floor, watching Newt bent low in front of him. He knows she’s using it as an excuse to snoop, but after what he did earlier he bites his tongue and doesn’t call her on it. 

“Thank you,” Modesty tells him quietly as he stands, cracking the knuckles in his hand.

“It’s no problem, of course.” 

“I asked Tina what you liked to get at the Chinese place. I hope that’s okay.”

“Depends if she told you the truth or not,” Newt says, looking down the hall like he’s wondering if that was, in fact, the case. “She has a hard time remembering what she likes herself, much less me.”

“She still has excellent hearing, too,” Tina offers coolly as she steps back into the kitchen. Her short hair is pulled back, though half of it doesn’t quite make the ponytail she’s attempted. She’s wearing a soft looking navy pullover with old jeans and sneakers, and seems to be made aware of the difference in her attire and the rest of them as she props up on the doorframe.

“If I’d known this was a dinner party, I would have had Queenie doll me up like the rest of you.” She pauses, looking between Newt and Credence. “Did you two plan to match?”

“We both just seem to have good taste,” Newt grins at Credence, and he flushes inexplicably. 

Tina hums thoughtfully, sending Credence a look he can’t explain and is too tired to try. 

“Won’t you come sit up here, Credence?” Newt gestures to the empty seat next to the one he flops down to occupy. Credence doesn’t particularly want to, but Newt hasn’t fired him despite himself and despite deserving it and Credence can’t really argue after what he’s done tonight. He uncurls his limbs and sits down gingerly, like it isn’t his own chair and he’s liable to break it if he breathes too hard. 

“Would you look at that,” Modesty says, leaning around Newt to peer at Tina with a weak smile on her face. “We have a Credence-whisperer.”

Inviting Newt was a mistake. He should have suffered the women alone as usual and none of this would have happened, probably. Shifting uncomfortably in his new seat, Credence worries his ragged cuticles and tries to ride out the embarrassment of his sister’s taunt, not looking at his boss.

“It hardly takes a mind-reader,” Newt says mildly. “Credence is very clear, when he chooses to be.”

“He’s also stubborn as an ox.” Modesty says, smile dimming just a little that Newt didn’t join in her joke.

“I’m glad to not ask him to do things outside of what he would normally do anyway,” Newt counters blandly. 

“I think the food is here!” Tina says, louder than what’s called for, as the doorbell rings. Modesty rises to greet the delivery person with her, and as she leaves she also looks at him in a way that he can’t place.

“Stubborn, hm?” Newt muses quietly. Credence glances up at him. “More willful than stubborn, I think. But there isn’t anything wrong with either.” 

Newt’s charcoal trousers stretch taut over the muscle in his thighs as he crosses his legs. Credence thinks if thighs are capable of looking “good,” then “good” looks like his.

“I’m sorry I didn’t tell you that you didn’t have to dress up.”

Newt looks down at his outfit before giving Credence a rueful grin. “You don’t like it? I’m colorblind, if it excuses things not matching.” 

“I...I do --” He cuts himself off as the girls enter the kitchen with bags of food that smell of soft, sweet onions and a bit of old grease. Credence ducks his head as Tina and Modesty both fuss over getting the plates sorted and drinks and flatware for everyone. Newt seems to have learned, like Credence, to let them nest and brood on their own without trying to help, and they both sit silently as they wait for the women to take their own seats with their meals. 

“Let the record show I did in fact remember Newt’s favorite platter,” Tina grins as she sits down opposite the man in question.

“You very nearly did,” Newt affirms, lifting his glass of water to her. He winks at Modesty, and Credence looks down at Newt’s plate to see what’s wrong with it. Tina does too, peering over the table incredulously.

“What on earth is wrong with it, Newt? You get number thirteen every time you eat there!”

“There’s broccoli in it,” Credence says as Newt opens his mouth to answer, surprising himself and everyone at the table. Newt cocks his head when he turns to Credence, brows raised. He has lines on his forehead, too, but not as heavy as the ones around his mouth or eyes.

“You…” Credence fidgets, feeling the need to explain. “Newt doesn’t like broccoli like that. He only eats it when it hasn’t been cooked or anything.”

“How do you know that?” Modesty asks. “I don’t think you know what you like to eat yourself.”

The back of his neck is very hot. “He mentioned it at lunch.”

Newt nudges his leg under the table with his own knee. “I very much did. Thank you for remembering, Credence. I’ll trust you with my order next time.”

Tina rolls her eyes. “You can just eat around it, you drama queen.”

*

Dinner is objectively short, in retrospect, though it feels like it drags as if through tar. Credence pushes his food around more than he eats it, but his sister and guests know him well enough to not push. Newt and Tina actually do seem to be on good terms, and only rarely does their conversation steer towards awkwardness. Mostly they talk about or to Modesty, who is happy to talk about her grades, wanting to try out for junior varsity lacrosse in the spring, and her plans to enroll in the police academy after she graduates. He’s lucky, he knows, that his sister didn’t take after him temperment wise; two surly ones at the table would have been worse.

“Is this yours, then?” Newt points to where Credence left their copy of _The Hobbit_ on the counter after Modesty finishes telling them about a project for English she hasn’t started on. “I think I have the same edition at home somewhere, my brother left it last time he came round. I’ve never made it all the way through, though.” He finishes sheepishly.

“No way,” she scrunches her nose. “I like sci-fi. That’s Credence’s.”

He tries for a smile when Newt looks back at him, because that’s what he thinks you’re supposed to do.

“It’s mine. I like it.”

“Do you like reading or just that one?”

“I think I’d like reading something else. But that’s the one we have, so I read it most.” 

Tina and Newt have a brief, silent conversation between themselves like he’d seen Tina have with his principals and teachers when he was in school. It always ended up being something that he didn’t like or want, and it chafes doubly now that he’s supposably past this stage in his life and she’s still doing it. 

“I’ll have to finish it soon so we can talk about it,” Newt tells him, grinning. Credence feels his chest constrict with an unfamiliar anxiety.

“You don’t have to. I can just -- tell you about it, if you don’t want to read it.”

Credence isn’t good at a lot of things. But he knows when people are upset; has learned the differences between screamers and criers and people who bottle things up before an inevitable explosion. Tina is the latter, and her tell is the splotchy red rash starting to creep up from her chest to her neck, and the way her grip on her fork suddenly becomes offensive, aggressive, though she hasn’t moved to change it. 

“I’m sorry,” he mutters, taking a bite of rice and chewing on it as long as he’s able to before swallowing.

Newt’s face crumples up in confusion, clearly unable to understand how the room’s changed. He puts his hand on Credence’s shoulder, his thumb nestled in the hollow space where his collarbone sweeps up to meet the socket. 

“What’s there to apologize for? Trying to save me from reading?” He gives a little squeeze, his thumb brushing the hollow divot between muscle and bone where it rests. 

“Credence has always been thoughtful,” Tina says, her tone the snapping close of a book. She rises, reaching for Credence’s plate with an air of finality. Modesty follows suit, grabbing a hold of her own plate before reaching for Newt’s. “Are you done with this? I’ll pack the rest up for you to take home.”

Newt drops his hand, looking up at the women well and truly lost. “I -- yes, I’m done, thank you. But you don’t need to pack any up for me.”

“Don’t be silly,” Tina says crisply from her place at the sink. “You’re almost as bad as Credence about not eating regularly. Here, Modesty, hand me those forks, will you?”

Credence reaches for Newt’s wrist when he moves to stand, brow furrowed in confusion.

“Leave it.” He tries to keep the plea out of his voice, but Newt’s expression goes soft so quickly he doesn’t think he manages.

“I know I can upset Tina pretty quickly,” he mutters, something conspiratorial about the way he leans close so only he can hear, “but that may be a record even for me.” 

He bites his cheek to stop a grin he can’t reason from blooming on his face. “I think it’s my fault, really.”

Newt leans back, and Credence realizes he was leaning forward himself. He wraps his arms around his torso and watches Modesty shoot sidelong glances at the stiff line of Tina’s back and shoulders until the leftovers are packed away and the dishes are done.

“Thank you,” Newt smiles warmly as Modesty sets his food in front of him in a little tied off grocery bag. “I’ll get out of your hair, I know it’s probably time you want to see the back of me. Do you want me to walk you to your car, Tina?”

“Actually yes, Newt.” Tina grabs her own bag of leftovers and pulls Modesty into a hug with her free hand. “It’s good to see you. Call me tomorrow so I can hear about your test.” 

Credence rises to his feet as Newt does, who reaches for Tina’s food so her hands are free as they walk to the front door. She turns on her heel right in front of the door, looking at Credence steadily. 

“It was good to see you, Credence.”

“Thank you for dinner,” he says evenly, hands in his pockets. 

Newt shifts both bags into one hand to offer the other to Credence. “Thank you for having me over Credence, I’ll be sure to crack into _The Hobbit_ when I get home.”

Credence shakes his hand but looks away from the smile on Newt’s face.

“Thank you.”

“Good luck on your test tomorrow, Modesty.”

“Thank you, Mr. Newt!”

Newt winces. “Sounds a bit like a PBS show, doesn’t it?”

Tina snorts, rolling her eyes and guiding them both out of the door. “Goodnight, everyone.”

The door doesn’t shut quickly enough. 

Credence is ready for that to be the end of it, until he sees Newt’s keys on the table on his way to the bedroom. He ducks out the door with them jingling in his loose grip, halfway down the stairs when he hears Tina’s firm reprimand drifting up from the foot of the stairs.

“-- need to back off, Newt.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Newt replies in the too-even, flat voice of someone who very much does.

“Whatever you’re doing with Credence. You need to stop it.”

Credence nearly drops the keys. He’s gotten beaten for this very same thing, with That Woman. Eavesdropping has always been his worst habit. He velcros himself to the wall and quiets his breathing as much as possible to better hear their conversation.

“I don’t want to talk about whatever you’re implying.”

“Because you know I’m _right_ , Newt!”

There’s a pause where Credence hears a car door open and the rustling of plastic and fabric.

“I don’t know that. And maybe -- maybe Credence is right. Maybe you need to back off a bit, too. You aren’t their case worker anymore.”

There’s a ringing silence where Credence pictures the expression tight at Tina’s slim jaw. The splotches on her neck are pink at her cheeks by now.

“You, of all people, do not get to say that to me.”

“Tina, come on. You can be their friend without --”

“I’m amazed you remembered what I did for a living, you know that?”

“Now you’re just being dramatic.”

“Credence does not need your type of...of looking after, Newt.”

Credence leans over the railing at the landing he’s on, confused as to what that possibly means. He sees Newt’s hand in a white knuckled grip on the open door of Tina’s little blue Jetta.

“Now I’m _quite sure_ I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

The keys slip out of his hand as Credence continues to lean forward, eager for a glimpse of the expression Newt makes when his voice goes rough like that. 

Both of them look up as they hit the cement below with a loud, jingling crack.

“S-sorry, Newt. Mr. Newt. You left these, I wanted to -- I dropped them, I’m sorry.”

Newt grins up at him, only a little tense at the shoulders still.

“It’s alright Credence. Thank you for bringing them down.”

Credence hesitates on the landing as Newt and Tina both continue to look up at him. The evening air is cold through his shirt, and behind Newt one of the streetlights lining the parking lot lights up. He turns heel and runs upstairs, doesn’t stop until the lock and deadbolt both are turned in the door.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content Warnings: Credence references past child abuse throughout the chapter (nothing graphic or in detail). Credence also mentions very, very briefly some internalized homophobia.
> 
> Credence has been gas-lighted by adults and authority figures throughout his life thus far, and this is shown in his unreliable narration throughout the story and referenced fairly heavily.
> 
> _
> 
> This is, believe it or not, a Christmas gift for my favorite husband and small bean Xan. Thank you for being so endlessly patient. I hope this is the Newt/Credence Sugar Daddy fic your heart dreams of. Love you! :) 
> 
> Also I have several other chapters already lined up for this but AO3 fought me so hard just formatting this chapter for what's left of my sanity I'll be spreading that out to the coming days.
> 
> Thank you for reading! If you have any feedback I'd love to hear it!


	2. Part Two

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> See End Notes for Content Warnings

**I.**

The gifts start coming soon After Dinner.

Credence doesn’t recognize them for what they are, really, because Dinner shifted something that leaves him unmoored and unable to fit the life-sized puzzle pieces around him together. Work becomes a fog that he can’t really parse through, and when Newt first places a can of Coke in front of him during lunch Credence doesn’t even really see it, until Newt asks if he’d prefer something else.

He’s finally placed that tone Tina used on Newt in the parking lot. It’s the same one she’d used with Mr. Graves. His dreams have become jumbled since -- one rough, dry hand may well be Newt’s pressing him flat to the mattress, splayed between his shoulder blades, but Mr. Graves’ inky hair is what he sees in his peripheral vision. Credence nuzzles into the stiff heat tenting Mr. Grave’s pants, but it smells off. Mr. Graves should smell of acrid smoke and leather and the sharp tang of hand sanitizer, not animal hair and coffee over something sweet like vanilla or cedar that seems to stick around Credence for days after, even when he’s awake.

“Credence?”

He looks up, dazed.

“Do you not like Coke?” Newt repeats kindly. He’s got a sandwich in front of him that’s not been touched, but his own drink is open. “I can get you something else.”

Credence has had soda a handful of times, and after each he felt the weight of the carbonation in his chest and throat like something trying to strangle him from the inside. The can is cold, and a bead of condensation slides down the side. Newt has asked if he wanted anything before, when he remembered to eat himself. But he’s never taken it upon himself to bring him something.

Credence fumbles with the poptab, but opens the drink without spilling it it everywhere. He makes sure to look up at Newt when he takes a drink, unsure if he’s doing what Newt wants. His throat bobs thickly as the first cold sip goes down, and Newt watches him with the same lips-parted stare that he’d used outside Credence’s apartment. Was he supposed to ask first?

“Thank you,” he says, a bit breathless. He’s not waited to speak until he’s totally finished swallowing, and combined with the bubbles in his throat that seem to steal a bit of oxygen each time they burst, his words come out more like a rasp. Newt’s own throat bobs oddly -- Credence has worried him by being unable to do something simple like drink properly.

“Sorry,” he tries to explain, tapping his fingers against the cool metal of the can. “We never really drank these. That Woman -- they weren’t allowed. I’m not used to the bubbles.”

“You don’t have to drink it, I’m sorry. I assume everyone is as caffeine dependent as I am.” Newt might go to reach for it, but Credence cradles it closer to his chest before he gets too far.

“No! I didn’t...mean it that way. I’m sorry. I like it. I like it. Thank you for getting it for me.”

Newt sits back in his chair, rubbing a hand over his mouth.

“It’s no problem.”

The next time he brings Credence a Coke for lunch, a bottle of water accompanies it.

*

The Coke was the first, in retrospect, but Newt builds up so slowly Credence can’t see it as such even after the Dinner fog starts to lift and he and Newt fall into a new routine. Credence doesn’t actually catch himself or Newt doing anything different from Before Dinner, but there’s a different feeling surrounding them that Credence knows better than to doubt. The air is foreign in his lungs where Newt is, there’s a different way their hands fall to their sides, a deference to something in the way they blink at the other.

After two weeks of Cokes and Water Bottles and watching while Newt brings his lunch consistently enough Tara muses loudly that he must have a secret wife now in his employ, Credence’s stomach rumbles. Newt looks up from his mouthful of peanut butter sandwich, and Credence nearly drops the water bottle in his hands. He’s hungry.

Newt wipes his mouth with the back of his hand hastily, putting the sandwich down on the little Ziploc baggie he’d brought it in.

“Are you hungry, Credence?”

He can’t understand why Newt seems eager, of all things, especially as mortification flushes close to the skin of his face and ears.

“I don’t...know. I don’t usually eat now.”

Newt reaches into the little insulated lunch box he’s taken to bringing with him. “Do you want a sandwich? I brought an extra.”

“You couldn’t remember to bring your own lunch for years now all the sudden you’re prepared with two sandwiches?”

He and Newt both look up to see Tara in the doorway, eyeing them critically with her arms full of Drippy.

“Newt, I think she’s swallowed something outside. Will you please take a look at her? I can’t see anything but I want to do an X-Ray to make sure it’s not lodged somewhere.”

Newt groans, standing. “Drippy, do we not feed you enough? You have to go outside to scavenge?”

“Don’t talk to her like that,” Tara scolds him, drawing the cat further to her chest.

“Credence,” Newt sighs tiredly as he exits, “please eat something.”

He stares at the food on the desk as Newt and Tara’s voices fade down the hall. He _is_ hungry. He’s not eaten a midday meal since school, and not consistently even then, preferring to squirrel what he could out in his pockets for later. But he’s hungry, now.

If his hands shake a little reaching for the bag Newt offered, no one is there to see it. He rips the sandwich into the smallest pieces he can manage with fingers that touch the bread itself as little as possible.

Credence manages seven of the sandwich pieces before his stomach seizes in protest. He puts the rest back in the bag, looking over his shoulder to make sure Newt doesn’t see and think he’s ungrateful. Tina picked Modesty up for school this morning, so she let Credence have the jacket. He puts the bag in the coat pocket and eats the rest for dinner, declining the Pasta-Roni a huffing Modesty offers him twice.

*

  
Newt is sly, is the thing. Credence is eating lunch once -- and once even twice -- a week before he thinks about it. It doesn’t feel like a gift in itself, even if he’s surprised every time Newt brings a sandwich out of his lunch bag for him. It’s not until he slides a copy of _The Silmarillion_ on the desk after finishing his meal that Credence connects the dots that Newt has been working up to this.

“I finally finished _The Hobbit_ , figured I’d start this one now. Have you read it?”

His fingers itch to touch it, but he hasn’t been invited to. “No. Did...did you like _The Hobbit_?”

“The parts I could parse though, yes. It’s a bit like he’s using another language sometimes.” Newt grins.

“That’s a joke, right?” Credence says slowly, wanting to double check.

“Only a bit. I suppose I don’t read a lot of fiction for pleasure. Certainly not since university.” He pauses, a calloused finger running along the pristine spine. This wasn’t a library copy, Credence notes. There aren’t even any smudged fingerprints on the cover. “Maybe you’re just smarter than me.”

Credence shifts in his seat, rubbing at where his bony knees jut out sharply under the kelly green polyester of his scrubs. “Don’t joke like that. You know it’s not true.”

Newt cocks his head, his eyes steady on Credence when he makes himself look back up. “Do you trust me to assess my own intelligence, Credence?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Then take my word for it, alright?”

“...Yes, sir.”

“So what do you like about it? The book?”

“I…” Credence grabs for his water bottle, twisting the cap on and off while he thinks. “Queenie gave it to me for my birthday when I was fifteen. I liked...all of it. I wasn’t allowed to read anything with magic in it with That Woman. I’d never thought of anything like it even...existing before.”

“Hmm. I understand. Adventure books always sound better to teenagers than to adults. Maybe I just read it too late.”

Credence frowns. “Why do you say that?”

“Well when you’re young it’s romantic isn’t it? To just pack up and leave and do something big. When you’re old you just think about all the stuff you would lose.”

“I don’t agree.”

For a split second, Credence doesn’t realize he was the one to say it. Newt’s eyebrows are raised, but a smile is on his face, like he’s pleased, somehow, that someone is disagreeing with him. That Credence, of all people, would think to know better than he does.

“Why not?”

“Did -- did you read it at all? Isn’t that the whole point?”

“Was that a part in Elvish I missed?”

That, Credence feels fairly certain, is a joke, and he tries for a smile. At least to not be actively frowning.

“I’ll tell you what,” Newt says, rapping his knuckles on the cover of _The Silmarillion_. “Why don’t you read this one first, then? So when I read it you can make sure I’m getting it right?”

“What?”

Newt slides the book over. “You don’t have to read it if you don’t want to, but…”

“I can’t take your book.”

“It can be a loan,” Newt says smoothly, like he anticipated this objection.

“Before you’ve read it?”

“I told you I’d prefer it.”

This edition is a black paperback with a graphic, minimalist mountain peak and a blue moon cresting behind their jagged yellow tops. Credence thinks it hasn’t even been opened once, and his hands reach for it before he decides to do it.

“If you’re...are you sure?”

Newt smiles at him, all teeth, and collects the detritus from his lunch to toss in the bin.

“I am positive.”

It’s a slow afternoon, and Newt leaves for a house call with a family of raccoons after lunch. Tara is outside with Drippy and a new stray she’s coaxing to the clinic the second he’s out the door, and after a moment of looking at the phone, daring it to ring in their absence, Credence gingerly cracks the book open, mindful of spine creases, and begins to read.

  
**II.**

“Can you reach that box for me?”

Newt is irritable in a way Credence hasn’t seen before. A man had come in earlier with a dog clearly in distress, only to deny the medicine and advice Newt had given saying it was “too much trouble.” Tara and Newt both had stewed all morning since seeing the back of him, their mood growing worse collectively like swelling rain clouds in the office as opposed to dissipating with time passed. Now they’re in the back storage room looking for a particular size of syringe that all the techs swore up and down they were out of. Newt, in an uncharacteristically combative move, had turned on his heel while they were mid-sentence, stomping back to find the syringes and prove them wrong. Credence had followed after Tara ordered him to, herding the techs herself into Exam Two for de-escalation.

“Yes, sir.” He answers, angling around Newt’s stiff body.

The box Newt points to is in the back corner of the highest shelf in the room, and Credence does get a fumbling grip on it after rising to his tip toes, but stumbles backward as he brings it down. Newt catches him with hands on his hips as he tumbles back, Newt’s broad front brushing along the line of his back, hands rucking higher on his sides as he catches his bearings. They are both very still for a minute, Newt’s breath tickling the nape of his neck, his grip still firm even as Credence’s feet are flat on the ground.

“Are you alright?” Newt murmurs. Credence wants to arch into the low nearness of his voice, same as he’s eager to be released from his grip. Maybe he imagines the dry glide of Newt’s lip at the juncture of his neck and shoulder. Maybe.

“I’m sorry,” he breathes back, his grip white-knuckled on the box in his hands.

Newt’s hands barely stroke a little -- just a tiny bit up and back down again -- at his sides before he releases Credence altogether, stepping back so he feels the cool, stale air of the room at his back where Newt had stood.

He turns to face Newt, the box an offering between them. Newt looks properly red in the face, like Modesty does in the way that precedes a cry. Of course, Credence reasons. The customer earlier had upset him, as a vet, seeing an animal go untreated for a silly reason. On top of Credence’s clumsiness and the tech’s ineptitude locating basic supplies, Newt has reason to be upset.

“I’m sorry,” Credence repeats. “That man was wrong, but it’s not your fault. And you were right about the syringes.”

“Oh.” Newt says, looking down at the box and back to Credence’s face, his own expression knotted like he’s working out a riddle. “ _Oh._ Oh, Credence. I'm not --”

He shakes his head and cuts himself off, reaching for the box. “Nevermind. Thank you.”

Their fingers brush past each other like kindling as Newt grabs it. Credence almost maintains his grip so his skin becomes familiar with the rough drag of Newt’s hands outside of a dream. Almost.

“Sorry for being a crabby old sod.”

“You aren’t.”

The lobby area is quiet when they make it back out to the front.

“How far are you in the book?”

“I’ve got another two chapters left. Did you want it back?”

“Not until you’ve read it as much as you want. Is it good?”

“...I don’t think you’d like it,” Credence says honestly.

“Do you like it?”

“Yes.”

“That’s good enough then, isn’t it?”

Newt rakes a hand through his hair and steps into Exam Two before Credence can ask him about what that means, but then again he really didn’t really want to, if he’s being honest.

*

He finishes the book at home two nights later, and brings it into work the next morning with lead pooling in his joints. Credence wanted to read it again the second he finished the last page, but had been drawing out the experience of reading it so long -- sometimes forcing himself to read only ten, fifteen pages a night -- that he knows Newt is probably missing it. When he settles into his desk chair, setting the tome reverently beside his keyboard as his computer hums to life, Credence tries to bolster himself to ask to borrow it again, after Newt has finished with it.

Credence looks up when he hears the jingling tinkle of Drippy’s collar. Tara’s computer is turned on to his right, and her sweater hangs over the back of her desk chair so she’s around somewhere, likely still trying to woo their stray. Usually Drippy stayed glued to her side when she did this out of some possessive jealousy, but today she hops up to the desk with a little chirp and stretches out so her soft, fluffy body brushes Credence’s arm. He reflexively jerks back a little, but Drippy seems wholly unbothered by it, laying flat so the line of her spine is pressed flat to his forearm where it rests on the desk.

It’s very still for a minute, where his heart beats high in his throat and he does his best to will the muscle and bone of his body to turn to stone. He expects Newt or Tara one to walk in soon enough and Drippy will get up to investigate and beg them for treats, but two minutes go by and Drippy is seemingly content to not give up her perch. He flinches when he feels the cat’s body start to rumble, ready to be scratched or bitten, but Credence realizes her eyes are closed and she’s...purring.

Utterly lost, Credence watches the fluttering of her belly and the twitching of her whiskers while the purring reverberates into his arm, burrowing deep into the marrow there. Cats purred...when they were happy, didn’t they? But Credence hadn’t done anything. Maybe she’d gotten into some of those weeds out front he’d heard Tara complaining about.

Drippy doesn’t move. Slowly, hardly able to believe himself, Credence lifts the hand not serving as a fat cat lounge chair and barely runs his knuckles at a place on Drippy’s neck he thinks is far enough from her teeth he could reasonably make an escape if she didn’t like his attention.

Nothing.

He strokes again, marvelling at the downy feel of her fur between his fingers. After a pause, he shifts to pet her with his hand flat to better feel the silkiness.

The back of his neck prickles, and he knows he’s being watched. Credence drops his hand and turns to see Newt propped in the doorway, one hand holding a paper cup of coffee, the other covering his mouth.

“...Hello.”

“Did I disturb you?”

“This is your clinic,” Credence frowns wondering how he could be disturbing anyone.

“I’m happy you and Drippy seem to be finding mutual ground.” Newt comes forward slowly, setting his coffee down on the desk. One hand comes to rest flat on Credence’s back above the chair to brace himself as he leans forward to pet Drippy himself. Credence’s gut melts to water, to something warm and receptive and unsettled. Newt is solid behind him, above him, and the hand between his shoulders is an anchor as much as it’s a push off of some ledge.

Newt doesn’t pet at the animals like this, usually. Credence thinks maybe he doesn’t get the chance to, so he’s quiet to let Newt enjoy Drippy’s softness. Sometimes his fingers brush at Credence’s forearm where Drippy still rests, and Credence thinks he might enjoy that himself, too.

He looks up out of the corner of his eye to try and log the expression Newt is making to file away for later and does a little double take. Newt’s jaw is dotted with stubble this morning, more copper than the color of his hair. Credence’s stomach flips or tightens or does something else that otherwise draws his attention to it.

“You. Are you growing a beard?”

Newt looks down at him, faces very close, and grins roguishly.

“You don’t like it?”

Credence thinks of when he's lazy of shaving his own face with a little frown. “Isn’t it itchy?”

Newt chuckles. “It’s an adjustment.”

There’s a second where his hand raises of its own accord before he catches himself, a botched attempt to raise it and stroke his fingers on Newt’s rough jaw as if he were a purring cat himself. Newt stares at his hand as he lets it fall limp in his lap. His throat bobs before he looks back down to the desk.

“Did you finish?” Newt asks after a minute. “The book.”

“Oh! Yes. Thank you, really. Thank you. I loved --” He cuts himself off, flushing. “Can...can I borrow it again? Only when you’ve finished reading it,” he tacks on hurriedly.

“Do you want to hold onto it longer? You don’t have to give it back now, you know…”

Credence looks back up at Newt. He’s stopped petting at Drippy, who’s now fully asleep and snoring, for her part. Newt’s right hand is flat on the desk, and his other still on Credence.

“I...couldn’t. That’s not fair.”

Newt studies him.

“It would make me happy if you read it as much as you’d like before you felt like giving it back. I promise I’m not so eager to try and read it myself that you need to rush.”

Credence looks back at him, the scar on his chin half obscured by the fledgling growth there. He’s trying to be sneaky, thinking Credence will forget eventually, or won’t notice.

“I won’t keep it,” Credence warns him softly. “I’ll give it back.”

The hand on his back flexes a little before giving him a little pat as Newt steps back.

“Whenever you’re ready for it.”

*

Tara is eloping.

She and her partner Sophie are going to Sophie’s parents in Palm Springs to break the news before high-tailing it to Disney World, where they’ll spend the week. This becomes Credence’s business when she barges in on their lunch, where Credence is re-reading _The Silmarillion_ and Newt nibbles absently on a wrap he’d had delivered from Jimmy John’s while scrolling through something on his computer.

“Alright,” she says briskly. Her hair is loose today, very fine and soft looking, reflecting gold in the light from the window. “Let’s plan.”

Credence looks up wordlessly, first to Tara, then to Newt, whose lips are pressed flat together and wrap in midair.

“Now?”

“No, I’d rather wait to discuss my wedding with your hand up a foal’s asshole. I need your _full attention_ , Newt.”

Newt sighs, putting his food down and gesturing to the chair next to Credence.

“Go on, then.”

“Right. I’m leaving the Wednesday after next. Credence, I’ll be showing you how to do payroll this week so you can do it while I’m gone. Drippy needs feeding twice a day but _only_ the dry kibble. If you see _that_ one trying to give her wet food and break her diet, let me know. Our new friend only likes those wet kitten food cans, though. I keep a special stack just for him on the shelf next to the backdoor. He eats midday. _Only_ midday,” She repeats firmly. “No later than two, no earlier than twelve.”

“Do we need to serenade him with anything specific while he eats?” Newt asks innocently, taking a small bite of his wrap.

“Yes he likes the sound of me kicking your ass, it helps with his digestion,” Tara shoots back flippantly. “Credence I know I can’t trust Newt with this --”

 _Then you definitely can’t trust me, either, if Newt couldn’t do it himself_ , Credence thinks, looking down to his lap.

“-- so please double check before you leave that no faucets are still running and everything is off and unplugged. The techs leave the microscopes on constantly so double check those. Newt knows how to use the security system in theory, but I’ll leave the code up front anyway since he will surely forget. Any questions?” She asks as she rises from her seat.

“Will you take the techs with you?” Newt asks, grinning.

“Sure, if you want to help me dump them in a river somewhere after,” she calls over her shoulder, already in the hall.

Newt smiles fondly as she leaves.

“Are you happy for her?”

“Hm? Of course. Sophie is a wonderful woman, she’s got Tara wrapped around her finger. And Tara deserves to be happy, she puts up with enough around here as it is,” he finishes with a wink, going back to his lunch.

“Do you want to get married?”

Newt looks up at him in surprise, stopping mid-chew. Credence himself nearly drops the book in his hands, shocked himself that he asked.

“I’ve thought about it,” Newt says slowly. “It’d take someone special to put up with me indefinitely like that, though.” He finishes with a small smile, trying for self-deprecating.

“That’s not true.” Credence’s pulse is a mile a minute, close to his skin. “You’re so...it wouldn’t be ‘putting up’ with you,” he fumbles.

“I -- thank you.” Newt clears his throat. “That’s very kind.”

“...Did you ever want to get married to Tina?” Credence asks after a thick silence had settled in the room.

Newt leans back in his chair, hands folded above his stomach.

“Only in the abstract, I think,” he says finally. “Tina is a good person and I loved her very much for it. But I think we wanted...different things, ultimately.”

“I understand,” Credence says, when he only kind of does. The important thing, he thinks, to take away is Newt’s use of the past tense. Her name on Newt’s tongue doesn’t sound wistful anymore, and that is an Worth Noticing to Credence, somehow.

“What about you?” Newt asks slyly, clearly ready to move on from talking about Tina. “Do you ever want to get married to someone?”

Credence blinks.

“No.”

“Why’s that?”

His brow furrows, trying to puzzle out why Newt needs such an obvious answer spelled out for him.

“Who would want to do that with me?”

There’s ten minutes left of their lunch break, and Credence goes back to reading through it while Newt is stiff and unmoving in his desk chair.

**III.**

Credence triple checks each step of his slow process through payroll before walking it back to Newt to sign. The clinic is chugging along without Tara at its helm; not totally off the rails, but certainly not continuing as if unaware of her absence. Newt looks more ruffled each day, though some of that may just be the beard slowly growing to cover his face. Credence scrambles to keep things under control and keep Newt’s stress levels as low as possible, but he knows he’s not as good as Tara and it grates.

“I’ve got payroll,” He says softly, knocking on the office door. Newt had some complicated tumor removal surgery this morning, and they’ve (meaning Tara) scheduled a little break after where he isn’t seeing any patients, even walk-ins. Maybe Credence should have waited, in retrospect --

“Come on in, please. Shut the door behind you if you don’t mind.”

For a moment, Credence feels the icy grip of fear. Was he getting fired? He knows he hasn’t been perfect, but maybe he’d gotten too comfortable thinking Newt would accept that.

“God, what a day.”

Credence sits the papers down on the desk gingerly.

“...Did the surgery not go well?”

“It was difficult, but I think I got it all out. It’ll come back, though. Eventually.”

“Is it...something else?” Credence looks at his drawn face. “Are you sick?”

He raises his hand, pressing it to Newt’s forehead. Newt looks up at him, face soft and open and very young. His eyes flutter shut, and Credence swallows.

“You’re a little warm,” he says hoarsely. He doesn’t drop his hand. “Can I...can I get you anything, Newt?”

This feels familiar, but he’d put it in a bad bin in his brain and tried to forget it. It shouldn’t be this easy to settle into after so long, but maybe this is the natural evolution of things; maybe this is where they were meant to be. Something about Credence makes this inevitable -- that’s what Mr. Graves had said before, anyway, and Credence is proving him right now.

His expression must give him away. Newt’s mouth falls open to a little ‘o,’ and he leans back from Credence’s hand. He lets it fall to his side.

“That’s very kind of you, Credence.”

His mouth is open like he wants to continue, but he stops himself.

“Actually, could I...would you mind grabbing a water bottle from the break room for me? It’s warm in here but Tara has a sixth sense about the thermostat, she’d know if we touched it.”

“Yes, sir.” He pauses. “May...may I have one as well?”

“Of course,” Newt grins, reaching for the papers Credence had left him. “Help yourself to anything.”

He takes a minute in the back room to press the cool bottle to his face, hold it to the back of his neck. Outside of Newt’s office, he’s able to berate himself. What was he thinking, touching his boss?

“Here you go.” Newt slides the papers to the other side of his desk and accepts the water bottle with a grateful smile. “I’m sorry for whining earlier. I know that tumor will be back, and it just...bothers me. And I know I’ve been leaning on you too much since Tara’s gone.”

“You haven’t been.”

He takes the payroll in his hands, studying the desk. “If you are feeling sick though. If -- if you are, you can ask me for help.”

Newt takes a big gulp of his drink.

“I will.”

*

Tara returns tanned, glowing, and serene. She even takes the initiative to tell Credence, unprompted, about the objectively beautiful matching rings she and Sophie bought on the beach. The bands are woven through with mother of pearl between rose gold, with soft purple and blue stones laid throughout.

“Like the sunset on a beach,” Credence realizes, the memory of a field trip long past coming to mind. He’d eaten vanilla ice cream out of a waffle cone so fresh it was still warm in his hands on a pier while his class had visited an aquarium. He’d made it halfway through the cone before tossing it, stomach churning, and snuck back into the aquarium before his teacher had noticed. The rest of the day and into the humid night he imagined he could feel the sun still warm and dry on his skin underneath the salt still clung to him.

In the present, Tara smiles at him, easy as melting butter. “Yes, that’s what I thought, too.”

Drippy winds between her feet and the legs of her desk chair and Tara coos at her, pulling the cat to her chest. Credence lets them have their moment.

Newt shoos her (and the techs) out early that night, so he and Credence do final rounds themselves.

“They were especially noisy today, weren’t they?” Newt huffs.

Credence shrugs. “No more than any other day.”

Newt chuckles, and Credence smiles a little himself.

“Tara looked happy.”

“I think she is,” Newt nods, sliding his phone and keys in his pockets. They walk out to the lobby and Newt flicks the light off, locking the door behind him. “Say, Credence...would you mind if I gave you a ride home tonight?”

“What? You don’t have to.”

“It’s supposed to sleet tonight. Your bus might be delayed…”

Newt has offered this before -- enough times Credence has lost count -- but Credence has never actually considered taking him up on it. But...Newt is in a very good mood, and Credence doesn’t want to do anything that might ruin that, even a little.

“Is it out of your way?”

“It’s not.”

“If -- if you’re sure you don’t mind.”

Newt beams at him. “Be my guest.”

His car is clean by virtue of being barren, more than particularly looked after. Credence guesses it’s used only for going to work and back, by and large, and just by Newt himself. He still doesn’t put his back against the seat fully out of a fear sitting too hard would break something.

“So, Credence.”

“Yes, sir?”

Credence likes the way Newt says his name. It sounds nice rolled around his accent, lilting from his mouth. And he’s never said it in a way that makes Credence hate it, never in a way supposed to make him feel bad -- never preceding anything but goodness.

“I’ve been wanting to ask you if.” He stops, clears his throat, starts again. “If you wanted to come round to mine for dinner.”

Credence sinks back into his seat like he’s been bowled over. But he guesses he has been.

“Why?”

“I...I enjoy your company, Credence. And it’s only fair since you had me over that I return the favor,” he tacks on after a moment.

“My company?” He repeats, mystified.

“Yes. Is that so strange?”

“...You know it is,” Credence says slowly, looking out the window. Sure enough as he watches, rain does start to pepper the windshield. He doesn’t know if he’d prefer being out there or not.

“I don’t think so,” Newt tells him firmly. “Have I lied to you before, Credence?”

“I -- no.”

“And I’m not about to start now.”

“...Will Tina be there?” He asks after a minute, fiddling with his seatbelt.

“...I hadn’t planned to invite her,” Newt says neutrally after a pause at a red light. “But if you would feel more comfortable, she and Modesty are more than welcome.”

“No,” Credence tell him quickly. “I just wanted to ask.”

“I know it’s last minute, but are you free -- tomorrow, maybe? This weekend?”

“...I am,” he says softly.

“Then I would like,” Newt puts the car in park in front of his building, but keeps his hands on the wheel, and his eyes on his hands. “I would like to take you to my place after work tomorrow, if you wouldn’t mind.”

Credence nods, lip between his teeth, not trusting himself to speak lest he say something so stupid he messes this up.

“Alright. Good.” Newt relaxes to his left. “Good. Very good. I’m glad.”

Credence reaches for the handle but doesn’t open the door, unsure if he needs to wait for a cue or if he should say something else.

“I’ll see you tomorrow, alright?”

“Yes, sir.”

Newt idles in the lot until Credence shuts the door to his apartment behind him. He peers out of his blinds and watches Newt peel out onto the main road, feeling somehow weighted and weightless.

“Who was that?” Modesty asks him stiffly. Her arms are crossed over her chest and her hair is mussed when he turns to look at her standing in the hall.

“Newt?” He answers, bewildered.

Her eyes narrow to slits.

“Credence. What are you doing?”

“I -- nothing.” Credence didn’t really realize how buoyant -- maybe happy, even -- he was feeling until starting to deflate under Modesty’s questions. “What’s wrong with you? Why are you upset?”

She looks down to the floor, biting her cheek.

“Is he like Mr. Graves, Credence?”

He stiffens. They don’t talk about Mr. Graves. It is a Rule.

“Have you been talking to Tina?”

“Is he, then?”

“No,” he says harshly, wrapping his arms around his middle protectively. “They are nothing alike.”

“Just. He’s your boss. You need this job --”

“I know.”

“Please don’t be mad,” her voice cracks. “I -- I worry. And Tina has been asking about you two so I thought…”

He breathes through his nose heavily.

“Tina needs to stay out of this.”

“She’s trying to help --”

“I _know_. It doesn’t matter, though. Don’t you see?”

“I just. You got bad, Credence. I don’t want to see that again.”

Modesty shuffles on her feet and Credence hugs her, trying to put a stopper on his temper and his guilt alike. It’s not Modesty’s fault. He tells himself that until the words mean something, and keeps going till they stop being anything but syllables and sounds.

That night, when Modesty has gone to bed, Credence creaks into the kitchen and opens the drawer where they keep a little prepaid for emergencies. There’s only a few numbers in there, Tina’s chief among them.

He works on his text for longer than it’s worth, but is almost happy when he sends it.

“This is Credence. Please do not make Modesty think badly of Newt. He is very good and you should know that. Thank you.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content Warnings: Credence continues to reference in little detail his abusive childhood. An implied relationship/sexual advance with an authority figure (school counselor) is mentioned with minor detail in a dream. There is food-weirdness pretty explicitly discussed in this chapter, relating to restrictive eating habits and behaviors.  
> \--
> 
> Feeback is always appreciated. Thank you for reading! :)


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> See End Notes for Content Warnings

**I.**

“Was that ride a gift, too?”

“Pardon?”

Credence looks up at him from where he’s fiddling with the copier. Newt is leaning against the wall watching him, the new stray Tara’s finally coaxed inside lingering in the hall a fair distance behind him.

“I know you’ve been -- the sandwiches and drinks, the book. Was the ride a gift, too?”

“Would you like it to be?”

Credence is slow pulling the paper from the output tray. “What would...would it have been anything else?”

“Maybe I didn’t want you walking in the rain.” He pauses. “Maybe I wanted to give you a ride just because I wanted to. Would that bother you?”

Credence hands him the papers. “I don’t know.”

“That’s alright, too.”

He doesn’t feel that it actually is, but that’s something he’d like to work through in private. If he had to work through it at all.

Credence is too nervous to eat lunch when it rolls around, even to sip on his water bottle. Newt seems to be on edge himself, knocking back another coffee in lieu of a meal as they sit in his office, though he usually stops his caffeine intake after eleven thirty.

“I don’t know if I have to say this or not, but I don’t really...cook. And I thought of trying to make something for you but I didn’t want to risk it.” His expression is a wince or smile one, but Credence can’t be sure. “So I’d like to pick something up instead. Can I ask you what you like?”

He fidgets. If he says he doesn’t have any preference, Newt might think he’s being difficult on purpose. Worse, that he doesn’t care about all the effort Newt is making. If he does scramble for a suggestion, though, it might be something Newt hates and suffers through trying to be polite to Credence.

Licking his lips, he looks up at Newt, who spins the empty cup in his hands absently.

“Can I ask for...can you give me some choices to pick from?”

“Of course you can,” Newt grins. “Thank you for asking me.”

He props his head up on his hand, scratching absently at the beard now plush at his jaw. “Let’s see. We can have Chinese again, there’s pizza...and an Indian place that’s pretty close to my house. What --” Newt cuts himself off suddenly, looking at Credence.

“We can start there. Do any of those three sound good to you? We have other choices if not.”

“Can we have pizza?”

Tina and Modesty both claimed pizza gave them horrible indigestion, so Credence can’t actually remember the last time he had it. He tells himself he will eat at least a full slice no matter what, if Newt agrees.

Newt nods as his phone rings, and he reaches in his pocket to answer. He frowns at the phone once he glances the caller ID, looking briefly between it and Credence.

“I’ll leave,” Credence says, rising from his seat.

“Don’t be silly, sit.”

Credence is back in the seat so suddenly it’s like Newt has more control over his body by a simple command than Credence is after nearly twenty years of living in it.

He tries to not look like he’s too obviously eavesdropping, even if he has no other option but to do so as Newt answers his phone.

“Hello, Tina.”

Credence’s stomach hits the floor, sinks down to where he thinks earthworms may have vacation homes.

“I -- yes. It’s fine, it’s just odd for you to call during the day, I suppose. Is everything alright?”

Newt stiffens a bit, frowning at the phone.

“Is that right?” A pause.

“Well, have you considered taking the advice?” He says smoothly. Newt’s hand balls into a fist around the phone at whatever Tina says.

“I suppose I didn’t realize it was so hard for you, to not think of me like -- Tina! Tina,” He says, softer, after Credence flinches reflexively at his raised voice. “Think about what you are saying. Please.” He grinds out through his teeth.

“Well I -- I suppose I thought you knew me better, too.”

Newt himself jerks away from the phone, then, staring at the line that’s now gone dead.

Credence’s lips are very dry, and even if he tries to lick at them before speaking everything feels like sandpaper, even the bones in his body grinding against the muscle and fat.

“I’m sorry.”

“Did you and Tina fight, Credence?”

“N-no. I…” He sifts in his seat. “Modesty told me something Tina -- I just. Texted her and asked her to not...talk badly about you. To Modesty.”

Newt is silent for a moment, but Credence isn’t looking at him so he doesn’t know what kind of silence it is. Slowly, Newt rises from his seat and shuts the door to the office, even clicking the lock shut. Credence’s pulse shoots through the roof, but he makes himself sit still for the reprimand he deserves.

Newt crouches in front of him between the chair and the desk. Carefully, he puts one warm hand on Credence’s knee. The other, even more slowly, reaches for one of Credence’s own hands sitting in his lap. It rests on top lightly, like how Credence touches things he doesn’t want to break or can’t afford to lose, like how he’s handled some of Newt’s own Things, though he’s unsure why Newt would be treating him like Something Nice when he knows he isn't liable to break or be damaged.

He waits for Credence to look away from where his freckled hands rest and to his face before speaking.

“That was very nice of you, Credence.”

Newt’s face is red again, but now that Credence has a closer look it’s not like how Modesty looks before a cry at all.

“It wasn’t -- it wasn’t right, is all,” Credence explains. Newt’s thumb brushes softly at the back of his hand.

“It was very kind. Thank you.”

Credence makes himself look up, words coming out in a rush. “She said you were like Mr. Graves. She should know better. I don’t want you to fight if you’re friends but it was --”

Newt squeezes his knee. “It’s alright, take a minute.”

Credence matches his breathing to Newt’s, who’s looking at him curiously.

“Who is Mr. Graves?”

“He was my -- he was a counselor at school.”

“...And Tina didn’t like him?”

Credence frowns. “A lot of people didn’t like him.”

Newt looks at him very carefully before speaking. “But you did.”

“I...he was nice to me, most of the time.” Newt doesn’t say anything, but Credence still feels compelled to continue. “He was patient what I was --” He frowns. Something tells him to not say ‘bad,’ how he usually does. Newt wouldn’t like it, Credence thinks.

“...Was there a reason Tin-- people didn’t like him, then? Since you did?”

“I -- I asked him to do something. But it -- it was supposed to be secret,” he finishes in a mumble.

“Oh.” Newt rises a little, and Credence sinks back into the chair. He’s scared him off, he’s ruined it --

“Credence, is it alright if I…”

Newt hugs him very gingerly, so softly at first Credence has to take a minute to realize why Newt’s chest is pressed to his face. He doesn’t really understand what’s prompted Newt to do it, but Credence won’t complain either. The scrubs he’s wearing are obviously clean, but over the smell of laundry detergent Newt smells of rubbing alcohol and animal hair. Still, Credence doesn’t hate it. He feels smaller and manageable where Newt’s arms bracket him, like Newt is holding him together, keeping him from messing anything up.

He releases him right when Credence decides to return the gesture, but maybe that was for the best.

“Thank you for telling me,” Newt tells him as he rises fully to half sit on the desk behind him.

Credence just shrugs, unsure how to respond. “I don’t think you’re alike,” he tells him again. That’s probably the most Important Part.

Newt’s hands briefly grip at the edge of the desk, knuckles white as chalk. “I’m happy to hear that.”

*

Newt doesn’t rescind his dinner offer, even if he’s a bit quiet the rest of the day after their lunch break is over. Credence doesn’t want to interrupt whatever it is he’s clearly thinking about, so he’s as silent as possible, himself, as he shadows him out of the door.

The car is even cleaner today than it was yesterday, Credence notes. A little tree freshener swings from the rearview mirror when Newt turns onto the road out of the parking lot.

Credence fiddles with his seatbelt, listening to the hum of the warm air through the vents. There’s icy patches on the road he can see in flashes when the streetlights hit just right, but Newt is careful, bordering on what Modesty would call “driving like a grandpa.” He only lives twenty minutes from the clinic -- (in the opposite direction of Credence, no matter what he said the night before about not going out of his way) -- in an older neighborhood that’s close to being overgrown with rosebushes and Dogwood trees, though they both are withered and brown, by and large, this time of year.

Newt’s home is a small colonial, the brick bright and bleached with age under the headlights as they pull in. The shutters are chipped but a beautiful robin’s egg blue, and they walk around a little sunroom on the side of the place to enter in two beautiful french doors.

It is, in Credence’s opinion, a Very Nice Place.

The sunroom is full of plants on mismatched shelves and tables and smells a bit like fresh, wet dirt, and Credence slips a bit on the hardwood floors beneath him once he rids himself of his shoes and pads forward in his sock feet. Newt grips him by the bicep as he slips.

“Are you alright?”

 _Aside from wanting to die?_ He thinks glumly, nodding and righting himself with as much dignity as he’s able. He won’t mess this up any more than he’s already done today.

Another set of French doors separates the sunroom from the rest of the house, and inside is blessedly carpeted and laid out openly so it looks bigger than it probably is. The furniture is a bit sparse -- everything is, Credence realizes -- but clearly worn and used. A plush couch has a permanent indent near the arm closest to the end table, where a few magazines and journals serve as a resting place for the television remote. The pictures on the wall are few but all candid shots of a genuinely happy looking, rotating cast of characters. Credence thinks he recognizes Queenie’s partner Jacob in more than one, and there’s one of Tara and Sophie in Mickey Mouse ears on their honeymoon stuck to the fridge with a magnet shaped like a cat’s rear-end.

Newt sees him looking.

“I’d like to say I didn’t buy that for myself, but I did.”

“This is Very Nice, sir.” Credence tells him honestly. All of the colors are muted and soft so Credence doesn’t feel overwhelmed, and it smells nice, like Newt does. Credence’s building smells a bit like old laundry no matter how many candles Modesty tries to keep lit.

“I’m not an interior designer, but it’s home.” Newt says a bit sheepishly. “I hope you can make yourself comfortable all the same. Can I get you anything to drink?”

Credence follows behind him when Newt walks up the two steps where the living room is settled up to the dining area and kitchen. Down the hall Credence assumes are the bedrooms and bathrooms, but he stops short where Newt does at the kitchen’s island, not wanting to look like he’s snooping.

“Credence?”

“Oh -- I’m sorry.” If he drinks too much now he won’t eat later. “Not now, please.”

“Just let me know, alright?” Newt visibly stops himself as he reaches for his phone. “Is there anything you don’t like on pizza?” He asks carefully after a minute where he scrolls through to find the number.

“I don’t know.”

Newt just nods. “Why don’t you go sit down? You can pick something for us to watch and I’ll order a few things for you to try.”

Credence plods carefully back down to the living area, but avoids the little crease that is clearly Newt’s favorite. He and Modesty don’t have a TV, and Newt has one of those obnoxious satellite set ups with a million channels so Credence can only scroll through the guide looking for something that he’s not quite sure of channel-by-channel.

Newt speaks softly on the phone, like he’s afraid of disturbing Credence when it should be the other way around, and flops onto the indented spot on the sofa with a beer in hand as Credence passes another show about murder. There were a lot of those, though why anyone would want to sit down and watch one, much less twenty, was beyond him.

“Nothing good on?”

Credence shrugs. “What’s good?”

He sees the Animal Planet as soon as he says it and clicks it eagerly before setting the remote down between them. _Yes, this was perfect._

Beside him, the couch shakes a little. He looks to his side and sees Newt bent with his head in his hands, shoulders shaking in obvious laughter.

Credence all but lunges for the remote, but Newt catches his wrist.

“No -- no, I’m sorry. I’m not laughing at you, Credence, I’m sorry.” He wheezes out between giggles.

“I’m sorry. I don’t watch TV and I just thought --”

Newt’s hand slides lower and squeezes his own before releasing it. “I know. I’m sorry, I don’t mind Animal Planet. I was just -- I’m a bad host. I didn’t want to make anything awkward for you but I can’t seem to help it.”

“You aren’t,” Credence shifts uncomfortably. “You never do.”

Credence is trying to look at the TV and can’t really see Newt’s face, but he relaxes next to him after a minute, taking a sip from his bottle, so he hopes it was a good thing to say.

The show seems to focus on a specific game reserve in Johannesburg, and all the animals they show, Credence thinks, look like they would kill a person soon as look at them. Did they have actual people filming there, or were cameras just set up where they hoped a rhinoceros was?

“Did you know,” Newt muses beside him, “that those rhinos don’t have front teeth?”

“...How do they eat, then?”

Credence looks beside him and Newt has tucked his lips over his teeth, miming chewing. He laughs despite himself, covering his own mouth with his hands.

Newt beams at him when he looks back up, and Credence looks back to the TV.

“If I had a big horn like that I wouldn’t need front teeth either.”

Newt snorts. “My brother -- this is what he does. Not at this park, but he’s a big game vet. All that preservation and what have you.”

Credence pales at the thought. He’d seen Newt stick his whole hand in a boa constrictor’s throat to remove something that had been lodged in there and thought that had been the height of a lack of self preservation gene a human could have. Apparently not, but saying that would probably be rude.

“...Does he like it?”

“Being on those WWF commercials? He loves it,” Newt says drily. “I always get laden with cocktail party trivia when he comes home for Christmas. Hippos can run faster than a man can, giraffes clean their ears with their tongue...all that useless stuff.”

Credence resolutely doesn’t think about the impossible scenario where he’d have to outrun a hippo or die trying.

“You don’t get along?”

“We -- he’s a bit older than I am, we aren’t particularly close.”

He doesn’t know if that is the entire truth, but there are headlights coming in through the bay window to his right, and Newt stands as the delivery person knocks on the door, laden with boxes that smell heavily of cheese.

Credence stands beside the couch awkwardly as Newt takes the boxes and shuts the door with his hip.

“Alright, let’s see what you like, then.”

No less than six boxes are cradled in his hands, and Credence stares at him dumbly for a second as he sets them on the island and starts rummaging for plates and napkins.

“Am I supposed to eat all of that?” He asks before he realizes how ungrateful he sounds, his stomach protesting at the sight of all the food Newt’s laying out.

“If you want, you’re welcome to all of it. But I just wanted to give you options to try and we can find out what you like tog-- so we can find out what you like.” Newt’s ears are very red. Credence can’t pass it off as just the light, so he looks down to the plate Newt offers him instead.

“What -- what do you like?”

“Ah. I am a pineapple and ham man, myself.”

“...On pizza?”

Newt winces. “Not you, too.”

*

Credence doesn’t want to leave, and Newt doesn’t rush him.

Pineapple on pizza is objectively the worst thing he’s ever put in his mouth, but he really likes the one with white sauce on it. He eats a first slice and tries for a second one, but doesn’t make it through half of it before putting it down, wincing.

“I can pack some up for you, you don’t have to eat if you’re full. I won’t throw it out.”

“Can…” On the television, the narrator tells them that giraffes don’t have vocal cords and can’t cough. “Could I come back here and finish it? Instead of taking it home.”

“Oh! Yes -- yes, of course. I’d lo-- I’d be more than happy if you did, Credence.”

*

The next night, they watch a movie. Credence doesn’t feel one way or another about it, but Newt seems to wipe at his eyes alot and cough like he’s trying to hide the fact he’s crying. It is sad, he supposes, as much as a cartoon could be.

Credence eats two slices of his favorite pizza before he really thinks about it and doesn’t tell Newt Modesty hasn’t spoken to him in nearly two days. The next day Newt brings in what he couldn’t force on Credence to take home and the techs descend on it like the hyenas they saw on the first night.

**II.**

Credence tries some of Newt’s beer on the third visit to his house a week later. He’s been planning tonight’s dinner since he woke up that morning from his most bizarre dream yet, and he doesn’t know if he’s a coward or not. But he’s heard alcohol makes you brave, so as soon as Newt is up to greet the delivery person -- they’re trying Indian, this time, which Credence is frankly nervous about -- he leans over and picks the bottle up. The whiff he takes of it is not promising, and when he dares a small sip he thinks he may die.

Sputtering, he doesn’t hear Newt laughing at him at first. After the initial unpleasantness fades, Credence looks up into the kitchen balefully and reaches for his water to wash out the taste of bitter bread from his mouth.

“Not a fan?” Newt asks innocently as he spreads out the cartons and plates from their order. It smells rich and a bit spicy when he crosses the kitchen threshold, but Credence can’t place anything beyond that.

“It’s -- bubbly? I didn’t think it would be like that.”

Newt smiles at him as he fixes Credence a plate. There’s a lot of sauces on whatever is in all the different cartons, and after a minute’s hesitation Newt gets him another plate for the second dish so they don’t touch and run together.

It’s thoughtful, and kind.

Credence steps close to Newt, and when he looks up curiously, mouth half open in a question he never poses, Credence leans over and presses their lips together.

His pulse is racing close to his skin and fast as a racehorse when he tries to pull back. He had planned to do that differently, in the car --

Newt reaches around to grab the back of his neck, holding him in place as he surges back up to make up for the little Credence had pulled away. His other hand grips at Credence’s hip and his mouth is demanding at Credence’s own, firm and insistent in a way Newt himself usually wasn’t.

Credence is -- more than content, more than _elated_ \-- to follow Newt’s lead, chase the bitter yeasty taste of beer on his lips so much better here than straight from the bottle; but when he raises his own hands to bracket Newt’s stocky middle the other man pulls away as if electrocuted. He drops his hands slowly, trying to steel himself for rejection, though Newt’s remain. His mouth is very red, and Credence’s own face feels like it’s buzzing a bit from where Newt’s beard scratched at him.

“I’m sorry --”

“I’m sorry --”

Newt releases the grip on his neck, and Credence tries to not feel the disappointment he knows will lead to mortification. It’s helped by how Newt places his hand on top Credence’s on the counter.

“I...dinner, first.”

“Before what?” He asks hoarsely. He feels oddly unsettled in his skin but not like how he does preceding an episode. He doesn’t think he’s felt like this before at all, looking down at Newt’s eyelids which seem heavy, his slick mouth available and the heat of him so close.

“Oh, bollocks,” Newt breathes, and they are kissing again.

Credence kissed Mr. Graves once, but it was just closed lips to closed lips, brief as a blink. Newt moves against him in a way Credence can only try to keep up with, but he’s happy to be awash in it.

Newt maneuvers him so Credence is pressed with his back to the island. Credence has his hands on Newt everywhere he’s able to; in the thick curls of his hair, one pressed to the warm side of his neck where his pulse jumps to meet his palm, down his arms and then flat to his broad chest.

“Fuck -- I’m sorry. Credence, wait.” Newt’s words are slurred together and rough as he pulls back. Credence follows him instinctively before he catches himself, leaning back and breathing hard.

“I’m -- did I do that wrong?”

Newt huffs, running one hand over his face. “I won’t rush this. I’m not going to ruin it now.”

Credence doesn’t know what he opens his mouth to say in response to that, but it doesn’t end up mattering. Newt presses a little kiss to his cheek before stepping back, squeezing his hands before removing them from his person.

“Please, can we eat first?” He takes a little breath. “And we can -- talk?”

He has never wanted to eat less than he does in this moment, but takes a plate blindly from behind him -- he probably won’t like it either way -- and walks to the couch like his joints are all wooden. He sits on the edge of the couch in much the same way and turns to look at Newt expectantly.

Newt chuckles as he ladles out his own plates from the cartons and sits on the couch. “I think I was right about you, you know.”

“What?”

“At your house, about how willful you are.”

Neither of them eat for a minute as Newt grins at him and Credence looks down, flushing. He pushes the sweet smelling rice around on his plate with his fork, and after a minute Newt sighs.

“You know I’m not upset with you, right, Credence?”

“I -- I planned that differently,” he mumbles. “I didn’t mean to surprise you. I don’t -- you don’t have to...if you don’t want to. You don’t have to.”

Newt puts his plate on the coffee table beside him and reaches for Credence’s to do the same. He grabs Credence’s chin so their eyes are level, then brushes at his bottom lip with a calloused thumb.

“Did it feel like I didn’t want to?”

Where Newt’s hand grips he’s reminded of the beard-burn rasping his chin and around his mouth. Reminded of Newt pushing him against the island, the purposeful presses forward, drags of his hands over his hips and at his throat.

Slowly, Credence shakes his head.

Newt taps his thumb against Credence’s mouth.

“Very good.” His eyes are more black than blue, and he speaks again very slowly. “Because I have been thinking about that for a...very long time.”

“...Really?”

“ _Yes_.” It’s carried on a big exhale and Credence leans forward so Newt’s hand is more firmly pressed against his face. “I have. I swear I have.”

Credence’s chest feels like it’s creaking open, protesting maybe from disuse; open like a window to catch a breeze.

“I dream about --” Credence cuts himself off, jerking backwards from Newt’s grip. _Oh, no_. He won’t tell Newt about them. He won’t ruin this either.

“You can tell me,” Newt’s voice is taut, warbling a bit like a plucked string. He lets his hand rest on Credence’s knee.

“I’ve had dreams about you,” Credence says finally. The hand on his knee squeezes, and it helps him stay in his body.

“Dreams about what?”

Credence looks up and makes himself be brave. He reaches for Newt’s hand and places it behind his neck where he likes it. Newt lets himself be guided and squeezes a bit as Credence drops it there, moving forward to grab at Newt’s shirt, brushing the warm skin and hair on his stomach as the fabric bunches in his fist.

“This morning I -- I woke up after you...you let me stay, after dinner. You let me take a bath after we did the dishes together and then you --”

Credence isn’t brave. It doesn’t matter what Newt’s said or done, he can’t sit here and tell him to his face he dreamt of his hands and mouth and imagined length of him like that.

“It’s alright. I think I -- I think I understand,” Newt murmurs. Slowly, he presses their foreheads together. “Credence, if you don’t want...I won’t hold anything against your job. You don’t have to do anything you don’t want to.”

The angle is clumsy, but Credence seals their lips together. “I want to,” he murmurs against them, like their closeness will reinforce what he’s saying, how much he means it. “I want to, I want to, I want --”

Newt groans, the rumble in his chest echoing in Credence’s own, and pushes him backwards, flat on the couch. Newt is heavy and present above him, legs tangled with his own and stocky weight something for Credence to arch into. Credence is startled when Newt trails his mouth down from his mouth to his jaw, then down his neck -- he can’t imagine who first thought to attach their mouth to someone’s throat like this, but thanks them in a litany that burns into his brain as he sinks into how _good_ it feels.

Whatever noise he makes as Newt licks at the juncture of his neck and shoulder must be horrifying, as he freezes above him, breath tickling at his skin.

Credence grabs at Newt’s hips, hooks his fingers in like anchors to keep him from running.

“I’m sorry, I’ll be quiet.”

Newt goes lax above him, prying himself up so he can look at Credence more squarely. “I don’t want you to be quiet, Credence.” He sits up despite Credence’s hands.

“I am not going to rush this,” He repeats firmly.

“You really can,” Credence tries weakly, still on his back. “You can.”

Newt eyes him like he’s very tempted by the offer.

“Tell you what…” He leans over to grab _The Silmarillion_ from the coffee table, which Credence had brought to finally return for good in some symbolic show before he started on his plan. But nothing is going according to Credence’s plans, tonight, and he sits up as Newt presses the book into his hands.

“Will you keep this, please?”

Credence frowns, confused. “What?”

Newt leans over, still pressing the book into his lap.

“Will,” a kiss, “you,” another, “keep,” another, “this?”

“That’s -- unfair.”

“It’s a gift,” Newt murmurs, half pressed to the corner of Credence’s mouth. “It’s always been a gift, not a test. I’d like it if you kept it.”

“...Is this a bribe?” Credence asks slowly as realization dawns over him.

“It can be if you want it to. But it can just be a present, too.”

“Why do you want me to have it so much?” Credence feels unreasonably grumpy whenever Newt is not kissing him, now that he knows he could be.

Newt sighs, pulling back. When he speaks, it’s very even, like he’s practiced it. “I like giving you things. I like thinking that I am taking care of you, even if it’s only a little bit. If you like the book, why do you not want to accept it?”

“I…” Credence’s head spins. “Take care of me?” He asks, feeling very small.

Newt is flushed around his ears and high on his cheeks.

“I know you take care of yourself, of course,” Newt says quickly. “But I still want -- I still like to feel like I am...helping.”

Credence can’t imagine why anyone would want to go out of their way or spend their own money to help him -- to _take care_ of him -- for no other reason than they wanted to. It was Tina’s job, when she tried, and he and Modesty were siblings, they did their best for each other because it was a matter of survival not too long ago. Newt didn’t know Credence as a brother or a job, but still he wanted to help. Maybe Credence couldn’t understand his reasons, but he did like the book, and it made Newt happy to give it to him. Would it even hurt his pride, now, to accept the bribe?

He curls his fingers around the book.

“...Kiss me again and I’ll take it.”

**III.**

In retrospect, he is grateful the next day is Sunday and he has the day off to plan out how Monday should go.

Newt had driven him home in a mostly comfortable, if heavy, silence soon after accepting his book. His gift. Credence is glad for it, though. If by tomorrow Newt has changed his mind or come to his senses or whatever else, he’s got a single few hours where he wanted Newt and Newt reciprocated it.

It also gives him time to try and talk to Modesty, whose bottom lip trembles when she looks at him, now.

She’s got three different binders all splayed open on the kitchen table when he ventures out of the bedroom midway through the day.

“...What are you working on?”

“School,” she says shortly. He sighs. She’s been like this all week, and nothing he’d tried has worked to soften her at all. What else could he do?

...What would Newt do?

He sits down in the chair next to her and puts a hand over her schoolwork. She tries to bat it away but he isn’t moved.

“I don’t like it when you’re mad at me.”

“Mad at you?” She looks up at him, aghast. “I’m _worried_ about you, you _jerk_!” Her voice always gets squeaky and thin when she’s mad, and it’s reedy and flimsy as paper when she finishes, turning in her chair to face him fully.

“About what?” He tries to keep his own voice even.

“You are _having sex_ with your _boss_!” She screeches incredulously. “How do you not see what a bad idea that is?”

“I am not -- we are not doing that.”

The look she sends his way is deigned to freeze lava. “I’m not an idiot. You go on dates, he gives you gifts. He looked at you funny when he was over and you can’t even hear anyone mention him without turning into someone else!”

“I…” He tries to wrestle down the things that make him want to snap so they can fill the places he leaves behind. “You and Tina are being too dramatic. And you joked about him being my date before.”

“Because that's all it was! A _joke_! And you know what, you are just _blaming_ Tina because you know this is irresponsible, Credence!”

“I want it, Modesty,” he grinds out. Every raised voice and heavy breath in the room seems to stoke that heat under his skin that begs for an excuse. “I’m not an idiot either. You and Tina both think I’m some -- freak, or some idiot who needs looking after like I’m an animal! You know Newt is good, you both do. It’s me you have the problem with!” He stands to his feet and takes one of her open binders with him as he rises, bringing it falling to the ground. Modesty’s eyes are shining but her chin is jutted out.

“Can you blame me for worrying how you seem to get into relationships with all the people who are supposed to be in charge of you? I don’t care if Newt is good or not -- if this goes bad, Credence, we won’t be able to _eat_!”

Credence kicks the chair he vacated, but it’s not as hard as he wanted to, or as hard as he could. It doesn’t feel like a victory.

“I don’t want you to talk about it anymore. It isn’t your business. Leave him alone.”

She slumps in her chair like her strings have been cut.

“Leave _him_ alone?” She repeats weakly. He doesn’t stick around to hear any more, though. He storms out and prowls the neighborhood with his hands deep in his pockets in an ineffectual defence from the chill in the air since he’d not put the jacket on before leaving. He stays out until it’s full dark, and when he finally comes home Modesty’s shut herself in the bedroom. He sleeps on the futon out front and she’s out the door the next morning when he’s beginning to stir awake.

*

Tara eyes him suspiciously that morning, and Credence ignores her as best as he’s able. He even volunteers to go feed the stray -- Tara’s named him Margaret Catwood -- to get away from her scrutiny. The little thing is skinny still, fluffy like it’s just stuck its paw in an open socket and black save for the white splotches peppering its chest.

He gives Credence a suspicious sounding _mrrrow_ when he scoops out some canned food next to the water bowl, scrunching his nose at the odd smell of it. He’s hardly seen Newt at all today, as his morning has been spent on house calls and as soon as he came in he was laden with a litter of baby chinchillas, and as Margaret Catwood saunters up, eyeing him warily, he plans out what their lunch will be like.

“You’re going to be taking my job before you know it,” Newt says warmly from the doorway.

Credence rises as the cat takes a cautious nibble of the food, still looking up at him. Before he can turn around, though, Newt’s hand is warm between his shoulder blades. He looks up and Newt is beaming at him, and whatever lingering doubts he had dissipate like clouds on a breeze.

“Hi.”

“How’s your patient?”

“He’s got an attitude,” he tells him honestly, looking back down to the little thing.

“...A bit willful, is he?” Newt asks innocently. Credence glares at him.

“Is it time for lunch?”

“Yes, come back please.”

Credence doesn’t have to be asked twice, and follows Newt with something full and yellow and buoyant unfolding in his chest.

“How was the rest of your weekend?” Newt asks him carefully as he closes the door to his office.

Credence shrugs, and when Newt is sat in his chair he adds as flippantly as he can, “Saturday was the best day.”

“Was it now?” Newt says lightly. He’s visibly trying to bite back a smile, his hands clasped over his stomach.

Credence hums in affirmation, looking down to his lap. He thinks Newt will probably not touch him at work, but he lets himself follow the whimsy train of thought that leaves them on the desk, in some way or another -- the train splits a few ways here, each option more tempting than the last -- and lets himself feel the buzz of anticipation hot and fast under his skin.

“I rather think I feel the same,” Newt tells him no little bit smugly. He opens his bottom left drawer and pulls out his lunchbox, sliding a sandwich Credence’s way wordlessly.

“Have you spoken with Tina?” He asks Credence after a moment where Credence debates eating the sandwich or not. It’s definitely a gift, now, he knows. And it would make Newt happy if he ate it, but he feels full on a satisfaction Drippy only gets when scratching something she shouldn’t and he doesn’t know if he’s physically capable of getting it down.

“No,” He tells him, ripping the sandwich into little pieces while Newt eats his own.

“...And Modesty?”

“We talked,” Credence winces at how defensive he sounds.

“Sounds like it went well.”

“They are scared of me. They think I’m going to --” He takes a bite of his sandwich to avoid putting his foot in his mouth. He doesn’t want to lie to Newt, but he doesn’t want to complain to him, either.

Newt is waiting for him to finish, face carefully blank.

“She thinks I’m going to get myself fired and we’ll end up starving.”

Newts face crumples in on itself like a tissue and he looks down to the desk.

“Ah. Well I’d hoped I’d made a better impression on her, I won’t lie.”

“It’s not you,” he tries to explain. “She thinks I will make you or -- I don’t know. Quit and leave her homeless or whatever. She’s dramatic.”

“Well. Like I’ve told you, this -- I would never hold anything against your job,” Newt says a little stiffly. “I understand her concern --”

“I don’t,” Credence mumbles sullenly.

“-- but I don’t want you to worry about it, either.”

Credence looks up at him, blinking. “I haven’t. I don’t.”

Newt’s face goes very soft. “You haven’t, have you?”

Why would he, now? Newt’s never done anything to make him think he should. That Newt was anything but good. Maybe if he felt like thinking about it, he would worry again, like he did before. But whatever Newt's allowing him to have is better than this job, than any job. Becasue he’s never planned ahead, and he isn’t about to not enjoy Newt’s interest because he might lose a job he knew he couldn’t keep forever anyway.

“Is that -- bad?”

“I mean, I don’t think so, of course.” Newt grins at him. Credence takes another bite of his sandwich. “I can’t say this is the most convenient...set-up, but we’re hardly the first or last.”

First or last what? Credence bites the question back. Even if he wants to know, he also wants to drop the subject in case it upsets Newt the way it would upset him, if their positions were reversed.

Newt seems content to leave it there, too, and Credence is content to watch him chart and finish his own sandwich until he speaks again, right as their lunch break is coming to a close.

“I’d like to take you home, tonight.” He pauses, hand midway to the doorknob. “I mean. Your home. Give you a ride home.”

It’s a gift. Newt likes giving them.

“Alright,” He says shyly, head ducked. It’s easier to accept now that he knows what Newt’s really asking for. But it’s weighted differently where it settles in his stomach all the same.

“...That was easy. No arguments or anything.”

Credence shrugs, daring to look up at Newt’s face, split into a beautiful smile. Maybe his acceptance was a gift itself, to Newt.

“Maybe I can start taking you home every day, then?”

“That’s not -- that won’t bother you? You want to?”

Newt hesitates before putting his hand at Credence’s waist and leaning in, pressing a kiss to the corner of his mouth.  
“You know I do,” he tells him softly.

“Yes. Okay...okay.”

*

Newt brings him a brand new, shrink wrapped box set of _The Lord of the Rings_ Wednesday. His palms sweat as he holds it reverently, unsure if he should be looking at it or Newt. They’re all hardback editions with the same minimal style that his copy of _The Silmarillion_ has. A mostly matching set.

“I know you have your copy of _The Hobbit_ ,” Newt says hurriedly as he hands it over. “I don’t expect -- but it came with the set, and I wanted you to have the others.”

“Thank you.” Credence looks up at him, fingers tight around the still sharp, fresh edges of the box. “ _Thank you_.”

“You’re welcome, of course. I’m glad you like them. What other books would you like, do you reckon?”

Credence glances to the closed door, licking his lips as the idea takes root in his brain.

“I don’t know...I have to read these first, anyway.” He stands, leaving the books on the desk, and locks the door as Newt obviously tries to not look crestfallen behind him.

“I -- will you let me know when you’re done, then? No rush of course! We can go to the bookstore together and look, maybe -- what are you doing?”

Slowly, he walks behind the desk. Newt has turned in his chair to face him, frowning, and Credence tries to not let it deter him as his heart tries to beat its way out of the cage of his chest altogether.

“I am -- I want to say thank you.”

He steps close between the V of Newt’s legs, and Newt raises his hands to grab at Credence’s hips even as he looks over his shoulder to the door.

“Credence…” He clears his throat. “I appreciate that. But --”

Credence leans over, hands at Newt’s chest and his throat, and silences the objection before he can make it.

“Please,” he says when Newt pulls away. Newt doesn’t look like he wants to say no, even as he looks at the door.

“I locked it. You saw me.” Credence doesn’t know what he’s doing, but he tries to trail his lips down Newt’s neck like Newt had done at his house. He is very lucky, because apparently this requires no finesse or experience -- Newt mewls _(!!)_ and pulls him forward by his grip at his middle. His hands slide down to cup Credence’s rear as he all but tumbles into his lap.

“This is a horrifically bad idea,” Newt rasps as Credence makes a sloppy circuit back up to the juncture of his jaw and ear.

Credence very nearly gives up. He doesn’t want Newt to feel uncomfortable or -- or _obligated_. But as he shifts he feels the stirring of Newt’s interest underneath him. He looks up to see Newt’s reaction as he gives a purposeful grind on his lap, hardly daring to believe it himself.

The hands at his rear bite into the scant meat back there as Newt hisses, looking away from Credence’s stare.

“ _Credence_.” It’s a warning. It sounds like a warning, anyway, but it also sounds like Newt doesn’t much mean it at all.

He grinds down again, a slower roll of his hips that has him stiffening in his own pants. His pulse is loud in his ears -- he’s nervous, a bit afraid, even as Newt gets a hold on his hips that’s anything but a push away. He’s still as one of Newt’s hands slides down from his waist to the front of his pants. It barely cups the tenting there, resting more than a real grip, but Credence feels dizzy with it all the same.

Newt takes a deep breath that only serves to press the length of him closer to Credence, more snug between the crease there -- where Credence feels on some base level Newt should be _more_.

“Christ. We can’t, Credence. Please. Come on.”

“Can I come home with you tonight?” He’s speaking before Newt finishes, unwilling to give up just yet. “I want to. Please.”

The grip at his groin tightens and Credence tries to stifle a keen, leaning forward into it. He meant for this to be for Newt, not himself, but he can’t bring himself to argue now.

“God -- don’t, don’t ask me to do this again,” he grinds out as his hand slips in the waistband of Credence’s scrubs.

Credence felt Mr. Graves hand only once in passing, and otherwise only his own. He didn’t think that the hand in and of itself mattered, but maybe he should have known better. Newt’s is rough and dry and warm around him, nearly painful as Newt strokes him to slickness that has his eyes rolling back in his head, bucking forward a little to better meet his rhythm.

He nearly topples back as Newt’s other hand leaves its steadying hold at his hip, grabbing at his chin roughly. Newt kisses him as eager and sloppy as his strokes, half shushing him even as he pants as loudly as Credence does, rolling his own hips to the pace he sets on Credence with his hand.

His thighs tremble as Newt drags his thumb over the head, and when he twists his grip at the base Credence knows he’s close. Embarrassingly close -- but he doesn’t have room for his self consciousness now as the low, sweet tightness builds upon itself each time Newt murmurs something at his jaw, his neck, into the shell of his ear:

“Good boy, come on -- yes, so good, so sweet for me, come on...come for me, Credence.”

He does.

*

Credence counts that Wednesday as a Very Good Day. He, in fact, counts it as one of his Best Days, even if they had to smuggle Newt’s ruined shirt out for a clean one after they had come to and his release dried uncomfortably in his underwear, which he had to walk around with all day (though perhaps that added to it being a Best Day, if he’s honest). Even if Newt declined his own fumbling hand after, and even as Newt told him firmly that would not be happening at work again on the car ride home his mood doesn’t deflate.

When he asked if it could happen again, somewhere else, Newt had only huffed.

“Yes, you incorrigible thing.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content Warnings: Continued references to an abusive childhood, gaslighting, and a semi-explicit mention of an inappropriate relationship/sexual advance between a school counselor and student. Continued food weirdness focusing on restrictive eating habits and behaviors. 
> 
> \--  
> It only took 20k+ words for Xan to get the inappropriate office handjob he requested. ;) 
> 
> Thanks for reading! Feedback is always appreciated :)


	4. Part Four

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> See end notes for content warnings

**I.**

Newt is sly, and Credence may have forgotten that.

He invites him to dinner twice that week, but most of it is spent talking (which isn’t actually horrible, if he stops being cranky and needy) and Newt stuffing him with different pastas from the Italian place around the corner, encouraged by how Credence liked the white pizza from before.

“No more, please,” Credence all but begs as he puts his fork down. He’s fuller than he may have ever been in his life; he thought once or twice that Newt may actually try to do the airplane trick with him and some of the garlic bread from their spread on the coffee table. Still, Credence curls up on the couch mostly content once he puts his plate down, toes inching under Newt’s thigh.

Newt looks at him with an eyebrow raised and lips still attached to his fork. Credence bites down a smile looking at him.

“They’re cold.”

Maybe Newt rolls his eyes, but maybe that’s the light.

“You ate quite a bit -- I’m proud of you.”

Credence’s toes curl reflexively at the praise. Newt pats at his bare ankle with one hand and Credence hums appreciatively without really meaning to.

“Did you still want to go Barnes and Noble tomorrow?” Newt asks, giving the top of his foot a little squeeze.

“Why wouldn’t I?”

“Well, maybe you want a break from me...it is your day off. Seven days a week is a lot.”

Credence knows that he’s needy, but doesn’t want to _sound_ like it to Newt. But he won’t lie, either, and tries to embrace feeling like static cling when he answers honestly. “That _is_ what I want. Uhm -- unless you don’t want to go. You don’t have to.”

“I know, but I want to.” Newt says around the mouth of his beer. His hand stays on Credence, and he lets himself relish it. “How far are you on the first one?”

“Only about halfway. Merry and Pippin are trapped in Old Man Willow.”

“Inside a man?” Newt frowns. “I don’t remember that in the movie.”

“...I’ll explain it to you later. I brought it, if you want --”

“Are you going to read for me?”

“--to do something else, I won’t bother you.”

Newt looks at him strangely. “Do something else? Why would I do anything else while you’re here?”

Credence frowns a bit. “I don’t…”

He feels the heat splotchy on his cheeks when he looks down to his lap. He doesn’t want to sound ungrateful. But Newt asked him, it’s not like he can lie.

“You haven’t -- or, I mean. You don’t really t-touch me when we’re here. Not like...I mean you do. And I like it! But. Since the office it’s been different. I thought it was because I -- made you do something you didn’t like. So I don’t want you to...to feel obligated to do anything to -- with me when I’m here. I’m happy just to...be here, and I won’t bother you if you want to do something else.”

Newt looks at him for a very long minute. His breathing is very deep and even the way his counselors -- the not Mr. Graves kind -- tried to make him practice when he felt an episode coming on. Credence wants to shrink into himself; he’s made Newt mad. And if it’s a wonder it’s only just happened now, it doesn’t feel like an accomplishment.

“I’m sorry, Credence. I seem to be -- very, incredibly bad at expressing myself to you.”

Credence’s stomach drops like an anchor. He’d thought -- he’d overestimated how long Newt would remain interested, even to himself.

“Would you come here, please?” Newt motions to himself, lifting his arm to make room for Credence. Slowly, Credence crawls over and lets Newt arrange him so his head is in his lap. It’s nice -- Newt had a cat-sick incident on their way out of the office and as soon as he crossed the threshold to his home he’d peeled his scrubs off, changing into a thick, soft pair of sweats and a worn shirt so thin in places Credence could see through it when the light hit. It’s nicer against his cheek than the polyester scrubs would have been, anyway, and made all the better by Newt’s hand carding through his hair and brushing at his forehead, the other twining with one of Credence’s above his stomach.

“Credence. I want to do nothing but spend time with you when you’re here.” He pauses, stroking down the bridge of Credence’s nose with his thumb. It’s an odd thing to do, but there’s something trancelike about it. “Even when you’re not here, that’s still what I want. You didn’t make me do anything I didn’t want to do. Do you understand that?”

Newt waits for a response, even the hand in his hair still. Credence licks at his very dry lips.

“Yes, sir.”

“I can’t -- we can’t behave that way at work. Tara could have walked in or any of the techs and...I can’t be distracted. But,” he only raises his voice a little when Credence opens his mouth to interrupt. “That doesn’t mean that I don’t want to touch you. That I don’t like it.”

“...You just don’t like when I touch you?”

“I do.”

“You wouldn’t let me then,” Credence says sullenly.

“And I told you why,” Newt shoots back lightly, even if his eyes are a little sharp. “I told you I’m not going to rush you into anything, either, Credence.”

Newt is very close, and he is very comfortable. Credence feels drowsy, close enough to dozing he could probably agree to anything if it keeps Newt petting at him like this.

“I’m not going to change my mind,” Newt murmurs after a minute. “Is that what you’re worried about? I won’t, we can take our time.”

Credence is finding it hard to be worried about much, anymore. Newt’s fingers are firm massaging his scalp and he’s so warm underneath him --

His eyes fly open from where they were fluttering closed.

“Are you doing this on purpose?”

“Hm?” Newt hums innocently, mouth tilting up as he tries to fight down a grin.

He definitely is.

Newt releases his grip on Credence’s hand, brushing the backs of his knuckles against his jaw while the other keeps playing with his hair.

“You’re sneaky,” Credence complains, even as Newt’s index finger traces the curves of his mouth while he speaks.

“That’s not very nice, is it?”

“It’s true.”

Newt’s hand is heavy when it grabs his jaw, directing Credence’s gaze to meet his own. His pupils are fat black when he looks down to him, and Credence can’t tell how much of his words are joking or serious.

“Did I ask if it was true or did I ask if it was nice?”

“N-nice,” he breathes. “You asked if it was nice.”

“Was it?”

“...No.”

“Very good.”

Newt pulls Credence’s hand up to kiss at his knuckles.

“Why don’t you read to me a bit, though? Since you did bring it.”

Newt plays with his hair as he reads through to the Prancing Pony. He catches himself falling asleep more than once, but Newt lets him.

It’s 3:34 a.m. when he wakes the final time, book still splayed open to where Strider has made his first appearance. Above him, Newt’s head lolls back off the couch and he snores gently, one hand resting on Credences’ stomach, the other loosely half tangled in his hair.

He should get home. He should wake Newt up or -- walk to the bus stop, at least. Modesty was likely worrying her cuticles to death, planning ways to make him suffer when he finally got home.

Careful of Newt’s hands, Credence turns on his side and nuzzles into his lap. He’d deal with it in the morning.

 

 

*

Newt wakes him despite very clearly trying not to. Credence looks up at him blearily as Newt pries the book out of his hands.

“Creases,” he murmurs, trying to blink his way back to life.

“...Wha?” Newt looks worse for wear than Credence feels, all puffy eyes and fluffy hair.

“Hair -- you weren’t even laying on it. How?” Credence yawns as he props himself up on his elbows. He’s never thought to classify himself as a “morning person,” (sometimes not even a “person” at all), but looking at Newt he supposes he is one by default.

“Hair?” Newt repeats groggily, like he’s never heard the word.

“...Can I make you some coffee?”

“Coffee. Yes. Coffee. S’good.” Newt nods before turning on his sock-footed heel and tripping over the coffee table, upending a plate full of garlic bread from last night.

“...Damn it.” Newt croaks as Credence rises to help him help pick up. He doesn’t have a specific reason to be smiling, but he is anyway. He’s glad Newt isn’t coherent enough to notice and think he’s being made fun of.

Newt takes the plate once the bread has been returned to its rightful place and tries to sit it back on the table but misses by a good four inches. “Shit. Shit. Wank. Fuck.”

“Sit down,” Credence huffs, warm fondness unfurling in his chest and not leaving much space at all for anything else.

Newt allows himself to be guided back to the couch while Credence picks up the now twice fallen bread and sets it on the kitchen island before he busies himself rummaging around Newt’s counters and cabinets to make coffee.

“Pot.”

“What?” He whips around as the machine starts to gurgle and bubble its way to life. “That’s -- probably not a good idea.”

“Nnngh. No. _The_ pot. Whole pot.”

“I don’t think that’s even legal,” Credence muses as he reaches in Newts fridge for cream. Newt whines a little behind him. He bites the inside of his cheek, smiling so wide it’s the right side of painful.

Credence pauses when he finds the cup cupboard. _Surely_ , he thinks, _he didn’t mean the literal pot_.

If he’s being fair, there is one mug in there; a collage of Mickey Mouse’s face with “#1 Boss” stamped on the front in a thick black -- written in sharpie, Credence realizes upon closer inspection. But it sits alone on the highest self in the back corner, clearly not called upon often.

The coffee pot gives a little beep and Credence looks at it, then to Newt on the couch, who’s still collapsed on it like he’s got hardly a bone in his body at all and pinching between his eyes.

“You drink coffee...straight out of the pot?”

“ _Please_.”

Newt’s voice is all gravel that rumbles behind Credence’s ribs, makes staccato _thunks_ down the line of his spine. He pours the cream directly in the pot until it’s the color Newt usually drinks it and gives it a little swill with the lid closed.

Careful not to spill, he steps down into the living room and stops in front of Newt, handing him the clearly medicinal caffeine. Newt sits up a little, one hand thumbing the lid up expertly while the other reaches for Credence’s hip, keeping him from moving.

It is unfair; Newt’s eyes are still half closed as he takes the first sip (though how he doesn’t burn his lips clear off Credence doesn’t understand), and Credence wants to memorize the line of his throat bobbing with it, the contented little grumbling sigh that follows. But Newt’s thumb brushes an arc on the little swell of his hipbone under his shirt absently, and it’s hard to think around it as more of his hand slides up, calloused palm flat to his side and stroking lightly before he speaks again, the pot over a quarter of the way empty.

“Would you like to sit?”

Credence blinks and tries to step back around Newt’s legs to take his place back on the couch, but Newt’s hand grips a bit at his side, keeping him in place.

He looks down, brow furrowed, but Newt is staring intently at Credence’s stomach, face red. Had he spilled something on himself? Was he going to get the couch dirty?

“Ah -- you can sit wherever, of course,” here is another big swing of coffee, followed a bit hesitantly by a second, smaller one. “But I thought, maybe you’d…” This time Newt’s gulp is big enough Credence half thinks the intent is to drown himself with it.

Newt looks up at him balefully. “You can tell me no. But…” He looks down at the floor meaningfully. Credence follows his stare. It’s very quiet for a minute -- a clock ticks in the hallway, but it sounds so far off it could be underwater somewhere, for all he knows -- before it clicks into place.

“...Oh. Oh?”

Clumsily, Credence kneels down on the carpet, pressed to Newt’s leg as an anchor, feeling awkward; his legs are too long to fit in the space between the couch and the coffee table comfortably, and he doesn’t know where to put his arms or hands.

If this isn’t what Newt meant, he begs the floor will swallow him whole.

He feels Newt relax where his leg is pressed to his side, and he looks up hopefully. And Credence knows that Newt is beautiful, but hasn’t felt it as viscerally before as he does now. Newt’s face is still a bit swollen and soft from sleep, and his hand when it cups his face is sleep-warm, though even still not as hot as Credence feels all over. His smile is sweet as the little knuckle length Mr. Goodbar he gave Credence last week -- Drippy had come up and sniffed at his mouth relentlessly while he sucked on it -- and his eyes are...Credence supposes the expression is _tender_ , if he had to put a name to it.

“Thank you,” Newt says softly, and Credence recognizes it at the same frequency that he thanked Newt for the Coke, the books, dinner, for allowing him to share the same space and wanting him around to any degree.

Newt waits for him to cross his arms on the couch and rest his chin on them before placing his hand on the crown of his head.

Credence listens to the soft noise of coffee settling Newt in his body for a minute before Newt reaches for the remote, flicking the news on. Credence nudges at his knee with his head, and Newt chuckles as he puts his hand back to card through his hair.

It’s nice. Credence likes it.

“Thank you for my coffee,” Newt says after a few minutes. “I’m sorry I’m such a bad host. If...do you want any coffee? Breakfast?”

Credence shakes his head.

“Well,” Newt begins slowly. “Why don’t we finish this pot and get cleaned up and we can go out to the bookstore before the after-church crowd gets there? If you still want to go.”

He does want to go, since Newt wants to go. He _also_ wants to stay curled around Newt’s leg, feeling small and letting Newt stroke at the nape of his neck with his free hand.

Above him, Credence hears the coffee pot being sat on the end table. He sighs a little and lets Newt guide his face up to look at him.

“Do you want to shower first, sweet thing?”

“I -- what?”

Newt blinks, head cocked to the side. “Do you not want to shower? Or...or do you not like when I don’t call you Credence?”

He squirms a bit. “I don’t know.”

Newt hums thoughtfully as a slow smile spreads on his face. “Sweetheart, darling boy, _baby_ \--”

Credence’s whole body is on fire, and he tries to hide his face in his hands, but Newt stops him, laughing.

“That’s so -- _embarrassing_. Is it supposed to be embarrassing?”

“We just haven’t found the right one, maybe.” Newt pauses, scratching his beard while looking skyward, all theatrics. Then, he croons, “Sugar, lovely, bunny --”

Credence whines, unsure to laugh or maybe cry a bit.

“ _Please_ ,” he protests, half heartedly pulling away.

“Alright, alright,” Newt shushes him, rising to his feet and pulling him up alongside. “Just Credence for now.”

He allows Newt to pull him close, wrap his thick arms around Credence’s waist and press a kiss to his collarbone through the material of his shirt. “Do you want to shower first, then, lamb?”

“I...you can go first. It’s your house.”

Newt leans back to look at him. “Well, we could --” He cuts himself off, pulling back to eye him critically. “Alright. If you’re-- alright.”

Credence tries to tidy Newt’s den and kitchen while the shower runs down the hall. He packs what he can into tupperware (mostly recycled takeout containers with no lids, shoved seemingly at random across several of his cabinets) and stacks them precariously in the fridge. The dishwasher is nearly full, so he fills what he can as neatly as he’s able and tries to do the rest by hand with the limited dish soap Newt has. There are no more dishwasher tabs, and Credence stands in front of the sink for what feels like a very long time before reaching for the little notepad stuck to the fridge -- he has to dig for a pen in two different drawers, as the attached one is dry as a bone, trying not to snoop while searching for it -- and writing in his most careful handwriting:

*Dish Soap  
*Dishwasher Tablets

He sticks the notepad back to the fridge as close to its original position as he can and is awkwardly fluffing and straightening the couch’s throw pillows when Newt re-emerges, pulling a shirt over his head.

Credence’s mouth is very, very dry.

“Oh! Oh, Credence. I hope you didn’t feel like you had to clean all this. I appreciate it, but...I may actually go to jail if I treat you any worse, as my guest.”

“I wanted to,” Credence shrugs, and it’s not a lie.

Newt stands in front of him and cups his face before pressing a kiss to the corner of his mouth. “Of course you did, you’re more considerate than I deserve. Thank you.”

“I just want to help you,” Credence murmurs, which is even more true. It is, maybe, the _most_ true thing. And he’s flushed and embarrassed but also a little pleased that Newt still holds his face and rubs at his cheekbones with his thumbs absently while he speaks.

“Well you know,” Newt grins, “If you don’t want to work at the clinic anymore I’ll set you up here full-time. An apron and everything...if Tara wouldn’t kill me, anyway.”

Tara wouldn’t, of course. But Credence doesn’t correct him overstating his usefulness to the machine that is Tara or the clinic or especially to Newt, who is so Very Good even if he forgets dish soap. Maybe he should, but this morning is strange and he doesn’t know what to expect, so he thinks he’ll allow himself a few seconds to imagine being as useful and good for Newt as he said; he imagines being allowed to wait for Newt in the Very Nice Place that is his house where he’s happy to see Credence after coming home.

Newt strokes the bridge of his nose with the tip of his index finger, bringing his attention back to the present.

“Maybe you need some coffee?” He teases.

“You need a lot of it,” Credence says slowly, still slipping back from his fantasy, “Can you afford to waste any on me?”

Newt is still laughing when he kisses him, and it is actually very good.

**II.**

Credence actively wants to leave Newt less each minute more the day stretches on. There is a very small part of him, very quiet and still insistent, that tells him if he asks it, Newt would let him stay.

But Newt made a point of directing him to the science fiction shelves, after they were done picking out Credence’s lot. He had held out book after book asking Credence if Modesty liked _this_ kind of sci-if over _that_ sub-genre, aliens or steampunk (he and Newt both puzzled over that one) or futuristic, as if Credence himself knew the difference. Still, alongside his own books in the bag squeezed now between his knees in the passenger’s seat -- ( _The Wizard of Oz_ and _The Chronicles of Narnia_ , the former of which Credence wants because he remembers seeing the movie, once, and the latter of which Newt insists upon because “it’s the true classic! Americans can only manage the worst children’s books, there’s no real magic in them at all everything is always about working,” as well as three books the clerk told them were a lot like Tolkien. Credence was overwhelmed just looking at them, and felt a bit like he wanted to cry as Newt paid for them cheerfully, making small talk with the cashier. He nearly dropped the bags altogether in his eagerness to kiss him not even fully out of the store, unsure how else to explain himself) -- two slim paperbacks for Modesty sat sandwiched, and Newt paid for them when he didn’t have to, and Credence would make sure Modesty got them as soon as possible so he would know how much Credence appreciated it.

“Thank you for letting me hog you today,” Newt beams as they turn onto the road his apartment complex is on.

“I -- no, I mean. Thank you,” Credence says, chewing at a ragged cuticle on his index finger. He doesn't know how else to say it, or to tell Newt how much he means it. Even the truth, if he’s brave enough to submit Newt to listening to all of it, doesn’t seem like it would come close enough. “No one has done anything like...I -- like it. I would like it even if you didn’t buy me anything,” He adds in a rush, so fast he’s almost lightheaded. “I would...I would like you. I do, I mean.”

Newt puts the car in park before twining their fingers together.

“You’re telling me you don’t want me to sign my will over after all? I’ll have to call my lawyer and change the plan.”

Credence is pretty sure that’s a joke, and gives Newt a pointed look though he just smiles beatifically.

“I’ll wash everything and give it back to you tomorrow,” Credence tells him after a minute of just enjoying their last few minutes sharing the same space. He has been rubbing the sleeve of Newt’s sweatshirt between his fingers so much there’s likely a hole in it already, and he kind of doesn’t want to wash it and give it back, but it’s not fair to Newt to want to curl up and sleep in his borrowed clothes tonight just to be selfish when Newt was kind enough to let him wear it in the first place.

“No rush,” Newt says, so evenly it’s clearly with effort but Credence can’t imagine with what. “Do you want to take these leftovers?” He half gestures to the little white styrofoam box in the backseat from their lunch.

“No, but --” Newt bought the food, he should take it home and eat it if he wants. But it was good; Newt had ordered it for him and he felt bad wasting any of it. “Could...maybe we could have to for lunch tomorrow?”

Newt leans over and kisses him, smiling.

“Of course, lovely boy. Do you want me to help you carry your books up?”

“No,” Credence sighs. “I don’t want Modesty to be rude to you. And --” Across the lot, Tina’s little Jetta reflects in the dying sunlight of late afternoon. Newt follows his line of sight, face falling into something grim.

“You’re welcome to stay another night,” He tells Credence, too lightly to not be on purpose. “We’ll wash your scrubs for tomorrow or I can let you use some of my own -- I liked to see you in this, anyway,” he finishes, brushing at the arm of his own sweatshirt with a weak smile on his face.

In the console, Newt’s phone buzzes.

“Ignore it. Credence, look at me.”

“I’m sorry --”

Newt cups his face in both hands and makes Credence look him in the eye. “Have you had a good day, Credence?”

“Yes. I loved -- it was the best day,” he mumbles.

“I thought so too. Let’s not let anyone ruin it. Are you sure you don’t want me to come up with you?”

Tina and Newt might still be friends, and if they get pulled into a fight Credence would feel bad. He’s also not one hundred percent sure what side Newt would ultimately fall on, so he shakes his head. “She -- sometimes she just comes over to help Modesty with her homework, since I’m no good at it.”

Newt kisses him again. “Brave boy. Will you -- will you let me know if you need anything? Maybe...maybe before you go to bed you could let me know?” He’s digging around for a pen as he says it and writes his number on the back of the book receipt.

“Okay,” Credence says quietly, “Okay.”

He’s slow getting out of the car, but Newt doesn’t rush him. His phone buzzes again, but Newt doesn’t look away from Credence.

“I’ll see you tomorrow bright and early, yes?”

Credence nods. There’s something cold and drippy starting to gape a hole in his chest.

“Thank you,” he says again, and doesn’t tell him how he desperately doesn’t want to leave even if he thinks, maybe, he should.

“I should be telling you that.” Newt grins. “I’ll wait for you to get in.”

Credence half climbs back in the car to kiss him again, and is up the stairs before he can talk himself out of it.

 

 

*

Tina has to nearly physically restrain Modesty once he enters the door.

“Hello,” he says timidly, the bag an offering between them. “I...Newt got you a gift.”

Modesty’s face is very red, her eyes very wet.

“I thought something happened to you,” she warbles, voice all water.

“I’m sorry,” he winces under that stab of guilt. “I didn’t mean to stay the night. I fell asleep --” He cuts himself off as Modesty moves around Tina, wrapping her skinny little arms around him and squeezing, all the while muttering something he can’t quite make out. He hugs her back, glad for the interruption. What happened was between him and Newt alone, and if it was embarrassing to think about reliving it for Modesty, having to do so in front of Tina would absolutely ruin it.

“I’m sorry,” he finishes lamely.

“Credence,” Tina says slowly, scrubbing both of her hands over her un-made up face. She looks very young like this; it has always made him uncomfortable. “Could you please make an effort to let someone know ahead of time before you go off the grid for over twenty four hours?”

He stiffens a bit but tells himself to stay in his skin. Modesty is still close, peering into his bag.

“Oh!” She gasps, the shocked, happy expression on her face wholly out of place with how red and flushed it still is, her eyelashes clumped together and glistening. “Did I tell you about this? How did you know?”

He looks down at the book she has held out between them. She may have, but he doesn’t remember, since all the titles sort of run together in a mess of colons and strange, made up words.

“Newt picked it out,” he tells her honestly. “There’s another one.”

She fishes it out, eyes saucer wide. “Did he, really?”

“We looked through a lot. He said you can exchange them if you want.”

Modesty blinks up at him, and he knows they aren’t technically, actually, blood related. But there’s something so familiar in the little crease between her brows as she looks up at him, her eyes nearly the exact same shade of brown as his, that reaches out to him somehow as like calling to like.

“I’m sorry. I wasn’t thinking. I don’t want you to worry about me. About anything.” He says again as he watches her run her fingers over the cover. There’s so much holographic text on it that the words themselves are illegible. He means it now more than before.

“I know,” she says softly. She bites her lip and looks up, only a little balefully. “This doesn’t...win me over, or whatever.” Credence appreciates that she makes at least a little effort to keep her voice down as Tina still eyes them critically from the kitchen doorway.

“You can just enjoy the book, you know,” Credence tries to not sound defensive, but maybe he doesn’t really succeed.

“Can I talk to you for a second, please?” Tina asks him, hands deep in her hoodie pockets.

Modesty will be upset if he says no. He nods, and follows her out into the hall after dropping his bag for Modesty to inevitably snoop through in his absence.

He waits for her to talk first, looking resolutely at her shoes and curling into Newt’s sweatshirt as much as he’s able.

“Credence, will you please look at me?”

Gritting his teeth, he drags his eyes upward. She’s looking at his shirt and back to his face very quickly.

“You’re not a kid anymore, Credence, You can’t just run off.”

“I didn’t.”

Tina frowns at him. “You -- people worry about you, Credence, when you just disappear. For whatever reason you’re actually gone.”

Credence feels his mouth pucker up. _People_ worry about him; Tina’s careful to distance herself from that statement, not including herself among that imaginary number as if it includes anyone besides Modesty, and maybe now Newt. Maybe. It grates.

“I told Modesty I was sorry. She seems fine now.”

Tine very slowly reaches a hand out and touches Credence’s bicep. He stiffens underneath it, but doesn’t pull away. Neither does she. He wants to crawl out of his skin altogether.

“Modesty wasn’t the only one, Credence.”

“I was with Newt,” he huffs, fists clenched tight. “I wasn’t -- I was fine.”

“Right,” she says slowly, her hand lowering. “With Newt.”

The silence between them is heavy with something Credence doesn’t know how to name.

“Listen.” she sighs after a minute. “I know...you aren’t a kid anymore. I don’t -- I’m not your case worker. But I’m trying to be your friend, okay? And Modesty’s. And as a friend, I’m worried about you. That’s what friends do, isn’t it?”

Credence stares at her blankly. Did she expect him to know the answer to that?

“And if -- if Queenie was dating her boss, I would warn her against it, too.”

“I’m not Queenie,” Credence points out as evenly as he can, breathing through his nose heavily.

“You aren’t,” Tina acknowledges, her neck splotching pink. “But in this case you can still be Credence and I’d warn you all the same.”

“It’s _Newt_.” Tina should know him better than to imply anything other than how good he is.

“I’m...I’m aware.”

“So I don’t see the problem,” Credence grumbles. “You know Newt. He’s --” his face is on fire, but he wants to have this over with. “He’s good. Why are you making Modesty not think so? You called him the other day, too. But it didn’t sound like you were being nice. Like you were -- being a friend, or whatever.”

Tina visibly bites the inside of her cheek, looking skyward for a moment before speaking.

“It doesn’t matter if it’s Newt. If anything, Newt should know better too. It’s -- it’s taking advantage of you. He probably knows that, too. You can’t say no if he’s your boss --”

Credence reels back, feeling that first stir to wakefulness underneath his skin from whatever it is that lives burrowed deep down in his body.

“I can. I do. Newt wouldn’t do anything like that.”

Tina takes a little step back, and the thing inside him takes joy in it.

“I don’t think he would mean to,” she tries, very evenly. “But there’s an inherent conflict of interest, there. I think you see that, and I think Newt does too.”

“What does it matter if I don’t mind?” Credence snaps. “Can’t I have something I like?”

Tina’s shoulders slump over, and she leans on the doorway like she needs help standing upright. Modesty pokes her head out of the door, looking between them suspiciously, but Credence just brushes past her into the apartment. He takes the bag back to their bedroom and shuts the door, and he doesn’t re-emerge until he’s sure Tina’s left.

When Modesty’s in the shower, he sneaks out to grab their phone as quietly as he’s able, unsure why he wants to sneak around but committed to it anyway. He doesn’t even bring it out of his pocket until she’s asleep and he’s leaving to wash Newt’s clothes in the machine downstairs. The washer is on the spin cycle before he settles on a text to send with fingers that only shake a little.

“Thank you for today. I am washing your clothes and then I’m going to bed.”

“Thank you again,” he sends right after, wanting to make sure Newt knows he means it.

Newt texts back instantly, three yellow smiley faces. They even have a bit of pink on their cheeks. Credence’s own face heats looking at them, warm as the dryer he’s currently leant on.

“You really can keep them, im not in a hurry.”

Credence looks at the phone, unimpressed. Newt tried that with the books, too. He won’t be fooled.

“How did you send those?” He sends instead.

“I’ll show u tomorrow, promise. :) Thank you for letting me know you’re ok.”

Credence taps his thumb on the corner of the screen, a knot in his brow. That one face looks different from the others. How many kinds were there? He stares at the phone a minute longer.

“You asked me to.”

“suppose i did. Thank u for doing it anyway.”

Credence is writing and rewriting his slow response when Newt texts again.

“I hope it went alright w Tina.”

Credence riddles out that “w” is probably short for “with.” He’d ask Newt tomorrow to be sure.

“It was fine.”

“Modesty loves her books. Thank you again. She says thank you too.”

Five smiley faces, these with rows of white teeth.

“We guessed right! Im happy she likes them. Have u started any of yours?”

“I don’t know which to read first.”

Newt texts back while he’s sliding the clothes into the dryer.

“Would you like me to pick?”

Credence blinks at the message. He hadn’t thought about it before, but now that is exactly what he wants.

“Yes please.”

Newt takes a minute to respond, and Credence paces the length of the washroom. Was that a test? Was he supposed to say no?

“Its late, so don’t start tonight. Try the wizard of oz first so when you read narnia you can see how right i am about it being better.”

Credence nods, though Newt obviously can’t see it, and then gets so embarrassed it takes him a minute to reply.

“Yes sir.”

“Thank you :) now get to bed its late”

“Okay. Thank you.”

After a minute, Credence sends another:

“ :) ”

**III.**

Tara hands him an extra fork at lunch.

He is very carefully microwaving the little styrofoam box so it doesn’t burn or melt or go rubbery and ruin Newt’s lunch while Tara watches him from the stilted round table opposite. There are a bunch of plastic utensils in a red solo cup in the middle, and she holds out two clear forks wordlessly before he’s even fully turned around to grab them himself.

“Thank you.”

Tara smirks at him, mouth full of ramen.

“Enjoy your lunch,” she says sweetly when he’s halfway down the hall.

Newt closes the charts spread across his desk near carelessly when Credence enters, making room for the box and the water bottles he has tucked under his arm.

“I really do think you’d look quite nice in an apron,” he says nonsensically when Credence hands him a fork, eyes a little glazed.

“Did you get into the anesthesia from your surgery this morning?”

Newt snorts. “I’m not quite so lucky.”

The chicken is a little chewy this time around, but the rice is still buttery and good. They eat in silence for a few moments, Credence taking maybe one bite for every four of Newt’s.

“So. Am I allowed to ask you about last night?”

“You can ask me anything. You don’t need...I can’t allow you, I mean.”

Newt’s brow creases. “Well I don’t know about -- alright. Fine, then you aren’t obligated to answer. You know that, yes?”

Credence nods, shrugging. He probably would answer whatever Newt asked, because he didn’t want come close to anything that was even half a lie or short of the full truth when Newt was involved.

Newt takes a deep breath. “Would you mind telling me what happened with Tina and your sister, then, please?”

“They thought I died or something. I didn’t...uhm. Obviously. They just worried. It’s my -- I should have called. But Modesty was fine when she saw the books, I think.”

There’s something sweet that clenches in his stomach when he realizes Newt is wearing smile on his face same as he is, that they share something and are sharing something else now.

“Tina was just.” He stops himself, unsure how to continue.

“You don’t have to tell me.”

“I don’t know how. And I...you two are friends. I don’t want to -- to cause you any problems?”

“You couldn’t.” Newt nudges Credence’s fork with his own. “I wouldn’t lie to you, Credence. You don’t cause me any problems. Tina and I are friends but you are --”

Credence watches Newt’s face do something complicated before he continues. ”You are not the cause of any problem I have. You...are the opposite, as far as I’m concerned. You do the opposite, for me.”

“Tina thinks that we cause each other problems.”

“And how do we do that?”

“Because we work together,” he mumbles. “She says it’s because you’re my boss.”

“We aren’t the first people to work together who -- who are involved,” he falters, taking a quick sip of water. “She’s just trying to be helpful. Tina is -- always trying to help. I can...talk to her if you want. But I think I know her well enough to say that she’ll let it go, eventually. She worries and immediately jumps to the worst case scenario -- and it’s her job, I understand. But she’s not unreasonable, and I’m sure she does just want you to be...happy.”

“Then she would leave you alone,” Credence says lowly, looking down at the leftovers box.

Newt half raises from his chair, leaning over to press a kiss to the crown of Credence’s head, his hand heavy cupping the back of his neck.

“I’m not worried about it, sweet boy. I’d like it if you didn’t either.”

Credence is slow nodding in response, putting his fork down. He’s done eating, full with the threat of a promise he isn’t sure he’s able to keep.

 

 

*

Newt doesn’t immediately put the car into reverse when they climb in that night.

“Are you doing anything tomorrow night?”

“Is that...a serious question?” He asks slowly.

“I wanted to take you out, maybe. If you wanted to go.”

Credence fidgets. “I -- what do you mean?”

“Well, I thought we could decide. Maybe dinner. Maybe a movie. Maybe…” Newt grabs his hand, holds it over the gearshift while his thumb makes soft arcs across the back of it. “I thought maybe I could take you out and -- and shop, a bit.”

“For -- for what? We just...you just got me the books.” What else could he possibly buy him?

“Well, anything you’d like. I have some -- some ideas, but we could figure it out when we got there. If you want to go.”

Credence angles in his seat to look at the lines of Newt’s face, in relief from the streetlight. He thinks that Newt’s face is a bit red, and there’s no real way he would ever tell him no if Newt wants it, even if he doesn’t understand his reasons for asking.

“Do you want to go?”

“I do.”

“...Alright.” He pauses, and he remembers when Newt first gave him _The Silmarillion_ to keep. “Kiss me? And...and we can go.”

Newt kisses him two, three times, and pulls back enough to pinch at Credence’s nose, smirking.

“If I didn’t like the conditions of your bribes so much we might have a problem.”

Credence frees himself after a little struggle, looking at Newt balefully and feeling no little bit mutinous, but Newt reaches for his hand again once they’re on the road and he supposes he is happy enough to let it go; to flex and examine Newt’s fingers idly between both of his hands and map out the differences between them. Newt’s hands are a bit shorter than his, but broad and wide enough they feel bigger. The lights outside illuminate the car only erratically as they pass by, but Credence sees a raised white scar curving around the root of his thumb -- around it like a circle or a set of teeth. His cuticles aren’t nibbled on, like Credence’s, and overall Credence likes them very much. It’s nice that they’re different and heavy and rough and not like Credence at all, really.

“Would it be alright with you, then?”

Credence stills his hold on Newt’s hand in his lap, cradled between both of his own. “What?”

“I mean, bribes aside. In all seriousness. You don’t mind letting me walk you around the shops?”

Credence shrugs. “You like it.”

Newt frowns a bit. “Yes, but I want to make sure you aren’t just doing it because I do.”

He frowns himself, looking down to Newt’s open palm in his lap. “Why -- is there another reason? If I just...if I just want to do it because you like it, isn’t that okay?”

His apartment building looms in front of them today. Credence has said the Wrong Thing, can feel it in the tension in Newt’s hand in his own, the charged quiet in the car as Newt disentangles his arm from Credence to put it in park.

“I do want to go,” he says very quietly. It might not be enough to fix it, he knows, but he doesn’t know what else to say. He finds a cuticle to bite at as Newt shifts in his seat.

“Alright,” Newt doesn’t sound convinced in the slightest, and Credence deflates into his seat even further.

“I’m sorry.”

“Nothing to be sorry for, is there?”

Newt grins as he takes Credence’s hands in his own and kisses each knuckle, but Credence doesn’t feel it the way he should. He can’t place the fluttering in his belly as anything but butterflies until it solidifies to Something Else after dinner.

Modesty feels things the same way Credence does, though he forgets that sometimes, and she’s quick to leave him be after clearing her plate, not meeting his gaze at all. And it makes it worse, even if he can’t blame her, because it confirms that something is wrong. _Actually_ wrong, not just in his head.

He can’t sleep even hours after she’s gone to bed. He finishes five chapters of _The Wizard of Oz_ while laid uncomfortably on their couch without absorbing any of it. The threat of darkness in their bedroom and the soft, rustling noises Modesty made tossing and turning in her bed feel like a straight jacket even from the distance of the quiet, well lit living room. Unyielding pressure already squeezes around him from all directions, and Credence knows the inevitable conclusion he’s stumbling towards, even if it’s been a while since he’s been led to it; some things, Credence reasons, are familiar not for frequency’s sake but the frequency at which they reach the blood. And that’s where Credence feels it the most, now -- his blood boiling as if searching for an escape route, each jump up to the vein a thumping, thudding test for weakness, for a way out.

Newt bought him that book, and it’s a gift for Credence that means as much to Newt as it does to him, so he is careful sitting it down when he half thinks to throw it, just to get it out of his space.

He stares two holes in the ceiling above the futon before yanking himself upright, heart hammering in his chest and breathing shallow underneath the pressure still clinging to him. The pill bottle rattles a bit when he opens it and chokes one down dry, but it doesn’t feel satisfying even if he knows it will help. This is something he did. He needs to do something to fix it, not just not feel bad about it.

The clock on the stove hasn’t been changed since daylight savings, but it doesn’t matter. Credence has a thirty minute window before the sleep comes, and he won’t go to bed without trying to undo his mess.

Credence strips his shirt off carelessly as if that actually helps relieve the pressure snaking around his ribs and chest and stares at the phone drawer, leant up on the back of a kitchen chair.

It’s too late to call.

Credence is slow typing out his message, willing each word to be more true than the last to make up for the ride home.

“I know it is late and I’m sorry. I am sorry for messing up in the car. Thank you.”

He doesn’t go as far to say he feels better after sending it, but he does feel more in control. Even if it ends badly it’s because Credence did something about it.

Credence showers and brushes his teeth and tries to sink into routine and is determined to not implode in on himself despite how his body is clearly wanting to. He nearly misses the phone ringing altogether while scrubbing a towel roughly over his hair.

All the joints in his body lock up before he’s stumbling to the kitchen, frozen and then in movement in the space of less than a blink. It dings again, once, right as Credence reaches it. The screen shows a missed call and then a text, which he opens dumbly. His eyelids are heavy and dry and he has to read the message seven and a half times before he actually _reads_ it.

“Are you alright? Whats wrong? I don’t know what u mean. Is everything okay?”

Credence slides down to the floor, ears ringing. Now he’s made Newt worry. Ice spreads cold and hard from his belly out. Was he playing dumb? How could he not know what Credence meant?

His head thunks back against the cabinet. He’s woken him up, made him worry, then made him lie to spare Credence’s feelings. Credence puts the phone down next to him and curls his legs up, forehead to his knees, and tries to think.

He thinks, and types, then erases, and thinks and thinks and shakes himself when he drowses, wakes himself when the phone clatters from his hands onto the linoleum. "You don't have to pretend, _'_ he writes twice,"I am sorry I am fine I just wanted you to know, _"_ he thinks would be the best way to start, maybe, but his hands are heavy and he thinks he just needs a minute to collect himself and really think this out. A Plan.

He wakes to the phone beside him lined with missed calls in neat rows, same as the blinds to his right letting thin slits of yellow, midmorning sunlight into the kitchen.

The stove clock reads 10:47, the phone 11:49. Credence has missed work.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content warnings: Continued, though mostly vague and implied references to gas lighting and abuse, as well as a panic attack at the very end of the chapter.
> 
> Thank you for reading! Feedback is always appreciated. This chapter was hard to get out for some reason. I won't lie and say I'm especially proud of it, but I hope y'all enjoy it either way. :)


	5. Part Five

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please see end notes for content warnings

**I.**

Credence dials Tina’s number without meaning to. He’s up off the floor and banging his head on the little overhang of the counter before he even scrolls through all the notifications. _No, no, no, no, no, no, no._ His lungs are useless, deflated things in the aching, tight squeeze of his chest. _No, no, no, no, no, no, no._

She answers on the second ring.

“Hello?”

“T-Tina, Tina. I -- I…I don’t know. I don’t know.”

“Credence?” Her voice is sharp, keen.

“I took -- last night, I took. But I slept and I don’t know...there isn’t a bus, I don’t know! I don’t know!”

“Alright, alright,” Tina tries to shush him. She’s never been particularly apt at being comforting, so to speak, but she also has the bizarre ability to become more calm the more crises are piling around her. Credence doesn’t know if he can believe she can fix this -- nothing will, of course; he’s going to get fired, he’s going to lose Newt, he’s going to lose Modesty, who was right like she’s always right -- but he has no one else to call.

“Credence, you said you took something and I need you to tell me what that is.”

He keens in frustration and all but stomps his foot like Modesty used to do as he yanks on his scrubs with the phone still cradled between his ear and shoulder as best he can.

“My -- what you got me! For...a long time ago.” He half spits, half cries. He doesn’t know how to make himself make sense but she should know, as much as she likes to insert herself in his business. What would he possible call her for otherwise?

“What?” Tina pauses. “What I -- the trazodone? Did you have a panic attack? Are you alright?”

“ _I am not at work!_ ” He shrieks, unable to tell her anything else but what runs through his brain at a thousand miles an hour and leaves scorch marks over everything else, jumbling it to uselessness.

“Oh,” Tina says, and he feels her relax on the other end of the phone even though that’s impossible, and it makes his vision bleed red and black at the edges. “You overslept?”

Credence kicks at the futon as he passes it, hard enough plaster dust peppers the floor underneath, speckles the dark fabric with dull grey. He can’t afford to fix the hole now gaping there, and it makes him kick it again, even harder. Mr. Hester will complain, and he doesn’t care.

“Have you called Newt, Credence?”

“Can’t,” he chokes out. Has he breathed at all since waking up?

“He’s worried about you, I bet. You should call and let him know you’re okay.”

Credence doesn’t realize he’s crying till there’s salt heavy on his tongue. “Tina, I can’t, he’s so mad, I know he’s mad --”

“You can’t know that,” Tina speaks evenly, and Credence thinks he can see her pinching the bridge of her nose before he hears her sigh over the line. “Do...I can call him, if you want. To let him...know you’re alright. If you can’t. Just -- I’ll be over soon, okay? And I’ll give you a ride to work, if you want.”

The line is quiet for a minute before it goes dead. Maybe she expected a thank you, but Credence doesn’t have it in him. The only thing that his body has made space for is that loud white staticy feeling that keeps his hands trembling. He has no room for any kindness in him at all.

There’s a knock on the door that startles the dustpan from his hand twenty five minutes later, and the drywall litters the floor again. After getting off the phone with Tina, he’d run their sink faucet as hot as it would go and stuck his hands under it like he used to until he felt alive enough for his brain to function, his body lagging behind clumsily. Tina had her own key, so he must have upset her more than he thought to knock like this, trying to prove some point Credence probably couldn’t understand even if he wanted to.

He’s slow rising to his feet, and he opens the door staring determinedly at his feet.

She doesn’t speak, and he doesn’t move until a hand settles on his shoulder and he flinches. When it gives a little squeeze Credence’s stomach falls through the floor.

“Can you look at me, please, Credence?” Newt murmurs. Credence stumbles backwards, his chest tight.

“I’m so -- I’m so sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry.”

Newt clicks the door shut and Credence wants to look up to see what to expect and see how to fix it but he can’t, and he hears Newt sigh and his guts all crumple and collapse into each other as if underneath a massive fist.

Newt bends a little, is slower than usual cupping his chin and guiding his face up. He looks...Credence can’t guess how. Like he is visibly trying to not show something on his face, which isn’t a good sign any way he thinks about it.

“Can you talk?” Newt asks him evenly, and it doesn’t sound like him at all. Credence tries to curl in on himself, to back away, but Newt’s grip is firm. It’s very quiet, and he knows Newt is waiting for an answer.

“I’m sorry --”

Newt adjusts his grip so his thumb is pressed against his mouth. He is breathing heavily, and Credence stops talking.

“Going forward,” Newt begins stiffly, “I would like you to not do this again. Ever again.”

Credence winces under the weight of his disapproval, what he thinks is restrained anger. He doesn’t deserve his restraint, though, and it receiving it grates the tender feeling pulp heavy in his skin.

“I won’t, I won’t -- I just. I took one of my pills late and I didn’t mean to sleep and I couldn’t call I panicked I know you’re mad and I called Tina but I don’t even know --”

Newt grips him by the back of the neck and pulls him forward, rougher than Credence expects, and he mumbles the end of his sentence into Newt’s shoulder.

“Don’t not call.” Newt says after a moment. “I -- Tara and I thought something happened to you.”

“I don’t -- I didn’t know how to...I know you’re mad and I didn’t know how to...what to do.”

The grip at his neck tightens to something painful and he hisses without meaning to. Newt freezes where they are pressed together and lets his hand fall to his side. Credence’s eyes are unbearably hot and scratchy. He wonders if he’s allowed to ask Newt to touch him again. He’d rather have the unpleasant contact than none at all. He’s familiar with that kind of touch anyway, and would prefer it grounding him physically into his body to the pain of absence every time, if he’s allowed the choice.

“I’m sorry,” Newt says gruffly. “Did I hurt you?”

Credence blinks back water making Newt’s shoulder swim in his vision, frowning. Yes, but not in a way that mattered, did it? Not the way Newt was asking. The touch had hurt, but so does not touching at all.

“I’m not --” Newt clears his throat before slowly putting both his hands on Credence’s shoulders. “I am upset, I won’t lie to you. But I’m angry because you didn’t call me when you could have. Can you understand that? Tina told me you took…” His thumbs start to knead at Credence’s shoulders, but he doesn’t feel relaxed for it. “I understand you being late was an accident, and I’m not upset about that. But I don’t want you to just not --”

Credence’s arms shake when they raise to wrap around Newt’s middle, and there isn’t even a full step of space between them but he still stumbles closing it to press their bodies snug.

Newt doesn’t return the gesture immediately. Credence swallows his sob down whole, sticky in his throat and replaced by slow, purposeful words that Credence means very much. He doesn’t want Newt angry or upset or anything but happy. Whatever it takes to get to that is fair game, as far as Credence is concerned.

“I am sorry. I didn’t -- know. What to do. I didn’t...I didn’t want to mess up again. Please let me...try again. Please let me try.”

Newt returns the hug so fiercely Credence blissfully can’t breathe for a moment.

“Will you sit with me, Credence?”

“Anything, please.” he murmurs.

Newt casts a sidelong, wary look Credence’s way when he sees the plaster and drywall scattered around the futon. He sits in the very middle of the couch, knees apart, and looks up at him very carefully. It’s Credence’s couch, but he feels like he should wait for an invitation to sit either way. Newt makes him wait a moment where he just studies Credence’s face and the lines of his hunched body before jerking his chin to the floor between the v of his legs.

“If you don’t mind.”

Credence sinks down, the thunk of his knees filling up the whole room, the whole flat, the whole building.

He lets Newt guide him forward gratefully, glad for the opportunity to do something right, glad for the warm bracket of Newt’s thighs around him and the way he seems to fit in the room better with Newt in it and keeping him small like this.

“No funny business while you’re down there,” Newt tells him, and Credence thinks he might be joking, a little. There’s a hint of expression in his face when he says it, anyway.

Credence wants to follow the rules. He does.

He rests his cheek atop Newt’s thigh, and dares to circle one hand loosely around his ankle. Newt huffs, smoothing a hand over his hair.

“If you came into work one morning,” Newt begins slowly, looking steadily at the hole in the wall where Credence had made a temporary home for the futon he now sat on, “and I wasn’t there. Would you worry?”

Credence thinks that’s a question he’s supposed to answer.

“Yes, sir.”

“If you got a call from me in the middle of the night I didn’t return when you tried to ring me back, would you be worried?”

That wasn’t exactly what happened. Credence chews his cheek. In Newt’s example, though, he knows his answer.

“Yes, sir.”

Newt’s thumb sweeps across his cheekbone. He taps at Credence’s chin until he lifts his head, and Newt holds it in place so they are looking at each other in the eyes.

“And if you got a call from Tina, of all people, after those two things happened, saying I wasn’t at work because I took ‘something’ last night, would --”

“I’m _sorry_!”

“Let me finish, please, Credence. Would you be upset?”

“I -- yes.”

“Why?”

“Because…” Credence tries to break Newt’s grip, bury his face back in Newt’s leg. “I’d be scared.”

“Good boy.”

The joints in his body melt to goo. Newt wouldn’t say that if he hated him, even if Credence gave him a reason to. He’s said it before, and Credence has loved it every time more than the last and felt -- or at least hoped -- that he meant what he said. Because Newt is a Good Man, and he doesn’t lie. He’d allowed himself to believe it each time, anyway, but maybe not quite like he latches on to this one.

Newt hums, running his thumb along Credence’s brow bone then the fluttering softness of his eyelid, the tips of his eyelashes.  
  
“Is there anything you want to say? You don’t need to apologize again,” he adds as soon as Credence opens his mouth. He looks back up at him balefully and Newt kind of smiles, a little. Credence has to wiggle his jaw loose a bit to try and speak again, but he tightens his grip on Newt’s ankle and does it.

“I...think you are very good. And -- to me. Good to me. I don’t know how to keep you but I want -- I want...to. I’m sorry for making you -- feel like I wasn’t thinking about you. I’m always thinking about you. I just mess up a lot.”

There is only the sound of engines revving distantly in the parking lot outside for longer than Credence expects.

“Oh, oh -- bollocks. S--stand up, Credence, Jesus.”

Was that the wrong thing to say?

Newt cups his face and kisses him soft and tender when they stand face to face, and he relaxes into it. Oh. Maybe not, then. Maybe not. Newt tastes like coffee where the smooth line of his mouth presses to Credence’s own, and the warmth of it curls impossibly down into his toes.

“You only mess up when you think I’m going to change my mind about you, sweet thing. And even then it’s hardly the end of the world.”

“Feels like it,” Credence mutters.

“I say it’s not,” Newt insists, pressing his lips to Credence’s cheek and stepping back. “Are you able to come in now? You can stay home if you don’t feel well --”

“I want to, please.”

Newt links their fingers together, gives them a little squeeze. “Let’s get to work, love.”

**II.**

“If you don’t think it’s a good idea, we don’t -- I mean, you know her best.”

“Don’t be silly, that’s incredibly thoughtful. I think Tara would love it.”

“I don’t -- I’ve only ever given birthday gifts to Modesty before, I mean. I don’t know what other people like so if you think she --”

“Credence,” Newt says gently. “I think it is a very good idea.”

Credence runs his thumb along the edges of _The Two Towers_ until he feels papercuts start to slice into the dry pad there.

“I want her to forgive me for being late before.” He admits after a minute where he just listens to the soft rustling noises Newt makes as he goes through the charts from the morning.

“...Do you have a reason to think she’s mad with you, Credence?” Newt asks very carefully. “It’s been a week, has she been acting differently towards you?”

“Why wouldn’t she be?” Credence frowns, brow knotted together. “I made her job harder.”

Newt’s face puckers up like he does when he’s about to try and argue Credence down from an objectively true statement, and Credence cuts him off before they waste the last twenty minutes of their lunch.

“Do you ever want to shave?”

He blinks, a hand reaching up to stroke at his beard reflexively.

“You don’t like it?”

“I do,” Credence shrugs. “Whatever you do I like.” He knows that sometimes Newt has to repeat things a few times for Credence to believe them, so Credence is happy to do the same for Newt, as this is clearly a concept he doesn’t easily grasp.

“If you -- I could part with it,” Newt says lightly, after a moment of staring aimlessly into his computer screen. “If you wanted to help.”

His stomach flips. “You...want me to shave you?”

“Is that strange?”

Credence thinks about it. Pictures himself propped on Newt’s sink, the weight of a razor in his hand and Newt’s warm body between his legs, the smell of foam and the heavy lidded expression on Newt’s face.

“I...if you want.”

Newt grins at him lazily, elbows propped on the table and face resting in the cradle of his hands.

“You’re blushing.”

“I -- I’m sorry?”

He leans back in his seat, eyes bright. “Nothing to be sorry for, is there? I quite like it.”

*

Tara looks at the box in her hands for a very long time.

“Thank you,” She says, very softly, after a very long minute. “This is -- very sweet. Very…”

She lifts the picture frame from the mint green tissue paper delicately. A collage he and Newt had worked on the night before over hibachi takeout is settled, barely wrinkled, in a silver frame stamped through with little Mickey Mouse heads.

Sophie and Tara are in the middle, a copy of the same photo from Newt’s fridge, their arms twined around each other, sunburnt faces pressed close. They’ve snapped pictures of Margaret Catwood and Drippy, Molasses the Saint Bernard (Newt handled that one), and a few of their other regulars; cut them out and taped them around the pair. There’s a group shot of the techs in the very bottom corner, and one of Newt and Credence himself in the corner opposite. Credence is red-faced and looking away from Newt’s phone camera, and Newt’s arm is slung around his shoulders, smiling face half nuzzled into Credence’s cheek. Stickers are stuck on throughout, and a few dots of glitter glue Newt had insisted on, unsuccessfully biting back erratic snorts of laughter while squeezing them out.

Tara puts the frame down like it’s liable to break, and Credence frowns a bit. It’s homemade but not that poorly done.

“Credence,” she begins slowly, rising from her chair. “I’m going to hug you, yes?”

“Uhm --”

Tara smells like lilacs and that vanilla hand lotion she keeps on the desk and the crown of her hair is silky soft tickling his nose. She doesn’t squeeze him like Newt or even Modesty, but holds on long enough he’s able to touch his palms very softly to the flat of her back. It’s strange, but Credence might like it. It’s unfamiliar but not Not Good. He gives her two very soft pats.

“Thank you, Credence. I know Newt couldn’t have thought of something so nice by himself.”

“I resent that remark,” Newt says lightly from behind them.

“You saved me from another year of a Target gift card and grocery store carnations,” she continues like she hasn't heard him.

“Funny how you never complained about them before,” Newt grumbles as Credence’s stomach hits the floor. He disentangles himself from Tara’s arms, reaching around to what’s become “his” filing cabinet.

“Does that -- you don’t want these, then?” He asks, crestfallen.

Tara pinches his cheek to Newt’s obvious delight, and when lunch rolls around she asks him and Newt back to share the little cake Sophie brings in. It’s too sweet to be allowed, in Credence’s opinion, all thick buttercream and green sprinkles that tickles the back of his throat and smears in Newt’s beard and leaves Tara’s tongue stained when she takes a picture on her phone, but it’s still Very Good.

*

“Do you reckon it’s about time we rain checked our date?”

Credence drops the file in his hands. The papers scatter around him with little _whooshing_ noises on the tile.

“Our -- our what?”

Newt blinks at him owlishly, freezing where he’s bent to collect the fallen papers.

“Date?”

“Is that -- oh. I mean. Is that what...we -- do?”

Newt stands only after Credence is fully risen, eyeing him critically.

“I won’t lie, usually any avoidance of the word ‘date’ comes a bit earlier on than we are now.”

From the front lobby, Tara calls out a goodbye and the door shuts behind her. It’s quiet.

“Do you still want me to drive you home?” Newt asks after a moment where Credence doesn’t really move. He thinks about nodding, maybe he actually does. They walk out together silently several minutes later. _Date, date, date, date, date._

“If I -- we don’t have to call it that, if you don’t want to. Now, anyway. We can...go as slow as you want.” He says, fiddling with the keys in his hand and not turning on the ignition.

“Am...are you my...my b-boyfriend?” Credence asks, the last word more air than noise, more the sound of all the breath in his body exiting his chest in a mass exodus at once.

“Would you let your boyfriend buy you something nice after work tomorrow?”

Credence thinks about it.

“I would -- let you. If I...you think I need it.”

“What if it’s just something you wanted? What if I just want you to have it?”

He remembers the Coke, the sandwich, the books -- and the first time he agreed to keep a copy.

“Would -- I would if m-my b-b-boyfriend kissed me first,” he fumbles, face on fire.

Newt is half out of his seat to comply before he can realize it, and Credence feels his hand fumbling around in the cramped space between his side and the door before the seat falls back suddenly, hitting the backseat with a _thunk_. Credence gasps, disoriented, but Newt only smiles as he trails down Credence’s neck, fully on top of him now and squished in the passenger’s seat together.

“Trying to manipulate me is not nice,” he says lowly, each brush of teeth and tongue on Credence’s skin a brand. He tries to buck up but Newt is deliciously heavy on top of him, a knee working between his legs. “You know I won’t say no to you. It’s mean.”

Newt finishes his sentence on a groan as Credence works a hand between them, squeezing the weight that’s warm and growing heavy there, twitching in what Credence would like to think is an invitation.

“You -- you said I could have what I like, right?” Credence breathes, words falling over each other and tangling together as they come out before he loses his nerve. He fumbles into the waistband of Newt’s scrubs -- an elastic waistband was honestly one of the last things Credence ever thought to be grateful for, up until this point -- and Newt sucks a bruise into the juncture of his neck and shoulder as he adjusts his grip in an effort to get down past Newt’s underwear.

“Can it be something you don’t have to buy for me?”

It’s the wrong thing to say, maybe.

Newt pulls back to look him in the eye, breathing ragged as rocks rolled round in a tin can.

“Please let me,” Credence murmurs before Newt can tell him no. If Newt will let him be -- let them be...together, like that, this is the only way he can think of to show how immediately, wholly grateful that makes him feel. “Please.”

Newt inhales sharply when Credence finally gets his grip skin-to-skin. Credence watches his eyes flutter shut with his own mouth agape, each eyelash fanned on his cheek something special, something perfect, something Credence Likes. His hands at Credence’s middle keep him settled in his body enough to focus on stroking Newt to life once, twice, slowly. Newt braces a hand above Credence’s head on the backseat and his weight is heavy above him perfectly, he keens in Credence’s ear perfectly, he fits in Credence’s hand perfectly.

“Would you believe I planned this differently?” It comes out strangely, like a wheeze gritted out through Newt’s teeth, but Credence likes it. He surges up clumsily to kiss at Newt’s neck, feeling a vein thrumming quickly underneath his mouth. His rhythm falters a bit around Newt’s length, but he dares to put his teeth around that little jumping point and trace Newt’s pulse up under his jaw, obstructed by his beard, behind the shell of his ear, shockingly soft. He feels the snag when his teeth catch too hard in places, but Newt lets him keep going and Credence thinks this is the best gift he could be given, just to touch him now how he’d like.

“God,” Newt chokes out. Credence tries to stroke him how he himself likes it, and if he’s getting it right or wrong Newt isn’t correcting him. Newt gets wet enough his strokes squelch in the mostly quiet of the car, his underwear soaked and Credence’s own front damp the longer he’s at it. Credence is fascinated by it, so different from how he gets, and his mouth waters with a sudden longing.

“I want my mouth on you,” he blurts out, because it’s true and the only thing he can really think about now.

“ _Jesus_ , Credence --”

Credence gasps alongside Newt when he comes, taken off guard by the final filthy grind Newt gives and the bitten off groan that vibrates through Credence’s body, deep in the marrow of his bones from all the places they’re touching. And where aren’t they touching, when Newt collapses on top of him, nuzzling at Credence’s neck and cheek? Credence is still hard in his pants but boneless feeling like he only gets after release. That was successful, he thinks.

Newt is still breathing heavily and Credence doesn’t want to rush him, so he retracts his hand as gently as he can before giving it a double take at how it glistens in the orange light filtering weakly from the street lamps outside. He hardly glances at Newt, afraid of being reprimanded for what he feels inherently is something illicit, and sucks a bent finger into his mouth.

Beside him, Newt hisses, and Credence yanks his hand away as if it burned his tongue.

“I’m so--”

Newt is pinning him almost uncomfortably when he turns to rest more on his side, grabbing Credence’s wrist and holding it still. Credence wouldn’t guess his eyes were blue at all, if he didn’t know better, and they are somehow glazed and sharp all at once and black as a beetle.

Slowly, Credence lets Newt guide his hand back to his mouth. He only relaxes a bit when he sucks another finger in his mouth while Newt watches. It’s heavy and sharp but Credence laps his fingers clean and when they’re done Newt grabs his jaw and kisses him fervently, like there are supposed to be words or meaning in it besides just skin on skin.

“Beautiful, incredible thing,” Newt murmurs when he pulls away, a bit breathless. He strokes at Credence’s jaw when he says it, so he nearly misses it altogether under the feeling of his fingers. Credence closes his eyes and preens under the attention. Newt kisses him again -- his brow, his right eyelid, twice on his cheek. After his breathing has slowed above him, he speaks again, chuckling. “Only you could get my aching old joints cramped up in a car seat like this again. It didn’t feel like an effort in uni.”

Newt kisses him before he can respond, crawling back to the driver’s seat with a grunt.

“H-- you did this a lot?” Credence mumbles, looking down to his lap.

He feels Newt’s eyes on him, and he shifts in his seat.

Newt grabs his hand, locks their fingers together. “I can’t say many people suffered me enough to say ‘a lot,’” he begins slowly.

“Oh.”

“Do you particularly want to go home tonight, Credence?” He asks after a moment, fishing his phone out of his pocket.

“What?”

“If you want to give Modesty a call we can go round to mine, alright?”

“Wh--”

Newt rests his hand on the tenting in his scrubs, only barely dimmed from earlier. “Would you call her, please? So we don’t have another misunderstanding.”

Credence keens into the grip and starts dialing.

**III.**

Newt touches him the entire drive home, stopping when Credence’s hips stutter upwards or he can’t bite back a whine. It’s not consistent or even purposeful feeling, but Credence can see Newt biting the inside of his cheek and smiling when he lolls his head to the side, panting. Newt touches him like how Credence fiddles with his shirt sleeves or Tara twirls her hair when they aren’t busy, which is not, Credence thinks, very nice.

He slaps Credence’s hand away when he reaches up to hold Newt’s wrist and keep the pressure there, turn it from absentminded petting to something Credence can grind up to.

“Wait,” Newt tells him no little bit sharply. Credence’s insides fold in on themselves, sucked down through a vacuum and leaving dizzying absence.

“Yes, sir.”

They’re at the final left turn onto Newt’s street, and Newt takes his length in his hand fully, squeezing.

“N-Newt, please.”

He takes his hand off altogether, parking in his driveway and slowly turning the car off and unlocking the doors. Credence doesn’t get out until Newt comes around to open his door, and he stumbles after Newt like they’re connected by a thread, pulled forward by the promise he felt in Newt’s hands in the car.

“I’m going to ask you to do a few things, Credence, because I trust you to do them even when I’m not there to watch.”

Credence stops short in the space between the kitchen and the sunken space of the living room as Newt tosses his keys in the little dish on the island to his left. He looks at Credence over his shoulder before shucking his scrub shirt off, balling it up in his hands and striding back to Credence.

“I want you to answer me when I talk to you if you can, please.”

“Yes, sir,” Credence says around his very thick, very heavy tongue sat uselessly in his mouth. Newt’s stocky chest is dusted in the same reddish hair thick at his jaw, trailing down the little softness of his belly into the waistband of his pants.

“Can I -- s-sit, please?”

Newt cocks his head, and Credence sinks to his knees, wanting desperately to feel small enough to not mess this up. Newt’s expression smooths over watching him fall to the floor.

He steps closer, and allows Credence to nuzzle the juncture of his thighs while a hand cards through his hair.

“Is that something you like, love?”

Credence shudders, tries to nod.

“What else do you like, sweet boy? We can try some of them together, if you want.”

He takes too long to answer, but Newt doesn’t rush him.

“What...did you want to do tonight?”

“I wanted to have a bath and maybe a shave,” Newt says lightly.

“Let’s -- that. I want to do that.”

Newt drags his nails across Credence’s scalp, humming. “Alright. I want you to eat while I get some things ready for you -- I have leftovers from last night, if you want them, but you are free to whatever you want. When you’re done,” he says very softly, tilting Credence’s chin up to look at him. “When you’re done, would you kneel like this for me outside my bedroom door? Could you do that for me?”

“Yes, sir,” he breathes. As if he could say no to anything that makes Newt’s face go so soft, his voice so low it sinks like lead into Credence’s joints, keeps him present in his body.

“Good boy --” Newt bites the inside of his cheek. “Wait till I’m out of the room before you stand, yes?”

Credence nods, not trusting himself to speak. His head feels heavy and everything around him feels plush verging on overripeness. Newt’s hand grips in his hair just briefly before he releases him, and Credence watches his socked feet disappear behind his bedroom door to his left.

He sits.

Food. Eat. Kneel.

Right.

Credence is slow getting to his feet, unsteady walking to the kitchen that’s become familiar as his own. He doesn’t reheat the little styrofoam box and nibbles the rice and shrimp cold, half hoping to cool whatever is yawning wide and warm in his gut. It’s nice, like most everything Newt orders for him now. It’s not spicy and not loaded with sauce so it doesn’t sit too heavy on his stomach, even if the shrimp feels a little funny when he chews it.

He washes his fork and the other bowls and plates he sees Newt’s left in the sink, feeling bizarrely fond. It bothered him when Modesty left her plates in the sink, but it felt like he was doing something Good for Newt to wash his dishes. Like it was the least he could do.

The longer he lets himself strain his ear to hear the noises coming from the bedroom the more anxiety starts to crawl underneath his skin, kneading the muscle to rubbery uselessness. But Newt has asked him to do so little, really, and even if he settles down heavy and unsteady next to the door, he does it, because Newt asked him to, and that is important to him.

He’s counting the little loops in the few square inches of carpet directly in front of him for several minutes before Newt opens the door. His knees are that warm, buzzy feeling that precedes numbness and Credence thinks it’s spreading its slow, low heat through his whole body.

“Very good, Credence. Thank you,” Newt tells him warmly. “Are you ready to come back?”

Credence looks up at him, unsure if he’s allowed to stand. “If...you are?”

Newt helps him to his feet, smiling. “What did you eat?” He asks as they walk through Newt’s bedroom -- and it makes Credence’s knees feel especially weak, especially watery, because everything smells like Newt past the threshold, as much as pressing his face close to Newt’s collar sometimes does, and they are walking past too fast for him to take it in like he wants to.

“Leftovers,” he says after Newt gives his arm a little squeeze. “I put them back in the fridge, if you want.”

“Later, maybe,” Newt nods absently, opening the door to the master bath. Lavender steam rolls out to greet them over the cedar and vanilla smell Newt usually wears. “Do you want to undress yourself, or can I?”

Credence blinks at him. “Me?”

“...Yes?”

“Oh -- _oh_ I thought you were...I thought I was gonna --”

Newt grabs a fistful of Credence’s scrubs and pulls him forward. “I’d like to do something nice for you. If you don’t want to, you can tell me. But I think you’ll like it if you let me.”

His eyes are doing the heavy lidded droop that Credence has a Pavlovian reaction to, at this point.

“Will you help?” Credence asks hoarsely. He’s embarrassed to ask even if Newt offered -- and he would never turn down the opportunity to be touched by him, really -- for a reason he can’t explain. It dissipates quickly when Newt adjusts his grip on his shirt and the back of his knuckles trail up Credence’s stomach, the planes of his chest, as he exposes Credence’s skin to the sweet smelling heat in the room.

Newt’s eyes only flicker up to his face briefly before sinking down to his knees and hooking his thumbs in the waistband of his pants. He’s slow tugging them down, careful helping Credence step out of the legs, tugging off his socks, and Credence thinks his entire body is scarlet, if he were brave enough to look down and see. Newt catches one of his feet and traces his fingers lightly up the sole, around the ankle and up his shin and the sensitive skin behind his knee, stroking there gently as Credence tries not to fidget. His breath is warm at Credence’s groin, and for a dizzying moment he half thinks he’s going to lose his balance and fall clear over.

“After,” Newt mutters, soft enough Credence barely hears it. “Don’t want the water getting cold.” He clears his throat. “Will you hop in the tub for me, love?”

He hisses reflexively sinking into the hot water in the tub -- too small even for two very determined people, he realizes a bit dejectedly -- but lets loose a strange, contented sound from his chest when he’s fully submerged. Newt is kneeling on the floor, arms propped up on the lip of the tub, watching him.

“Too hot?”

Credence shakes his head.

“More bubbles?”

He feels his bottom lip poke out a bit without his express permission. “I’m not five.”

Newt looks at him for a moment and tips one of the plastic bottles lined on the opposite side of the tub into the water before turning the tap back on, holding his fingers under the water and adjusting the faucet. Credence sinks a bit further into the bath, new bubbles foaming up quick and fragrant near his feet.

He hums to himself as he reaches for a washcloth, dunks it in the sudsy water near Credence’s left hip, and grabs for another bottle, drizzling some of its contents onto it. The humidity in the room is condensing in sweet little droplets in the hollow of his throat that Credence can’t tear his eyes from, and he leans forward when Newt straightens to lick them clean. His breathing stutters underneath Credence’s mouth. Credence feels dizzy with their closeness, the heat of the water surrounding him, and the weight of a promise that hasn’t been fully spoken between them. He gulps, millimeters from the skin of Newt’s chest, from where he wants to nuzzle the hair peppering the broad expanse of him.

The feeling of the warm, sudsy washcloth at his shoulder has him yanking back in surprise with a little startled squeak.

“Soon, sweet boy. I promise.” Newt catches his mouth, runs his thumb along Credence’s bottom lip. “Let me do this for you first.”

It’s awkward from the start, trying to move around Newt’s work with the cloth, trying to keep where Newt doesn’t have to stretch too far over the tub or around the gangly mess of his limbs. Newt grabs his shoulder with a little huff when he accidentally splashes water onto the floor. “You don’t have to do anything, Credence, relax. I’ll move you where I want you, you don’t need to think about it. Let me handle it, alright?”

Credence hunches over under the weight of doing something wrong. “I’m s--”

The washcloth dunks back into the water, brushes against his groin too firmly to not be purposeful. His eyes roll back in his head.

“Lean back for me so I can get your front, darling.”

He closes his eyes as Newt drags the cloth across his chest, over his shoulders, even trailing down his arms to the palms of both his hands. Newt has Credence stick his foot up to rub the instep with it, even in between each of his toes and back up his leg, behind his knee, the muscle of his thigh.

“Feeling alright?” Newt murmurs, softly enough Credence loses it for a moment in the soft slosh of the water around him, the little fuzzy noises the foamy bubbles make near his ears where he’s sunk down so far.

“I’ll get your hair if you lean back for me a bit. Scootch up a bit, yes, perfect. Such a good boy for me, thank you, love.”

Credence moans as Newt massages suds to life on his scalp, and doesn’t have the wherewithal to even be ashamed by it.

His hair is clean long before Newt stops massaging it, even going down through the buzz at the back of his neck. Credence lets himself be guided back down while Newt rinses him clean, lets his boneless, useless body be guided back up again out of the tub, lets Newt pat him dry and murmur words into his skin that mean nothing but the Good feeling he gets from the vibrations of his mouth to his skin.

“--carry you, if you want,” Newt grins into Credence’s Adam’s Apple.

“...What?”

“There you are,” Newt coos, running his hands up and down Credence’s arms. “I said I can carry you to bed, if you want, if you don’t feel up to walking.”

Credence looks down at himself incredulously through the fog still clung to him.

“I’m too big?”

“You wound me, I’m not so old and infirm I can’t manage a few feet to the right.”

He looks at Newt, water heavy on his eyelashes, while his brain catches up with him.

“...Bed?”

Newt’s hands cup his face, warm and dry and the drag on his cheeks and jaw a delight that curls liquid heat in his groin. He kisses him like a brand, like he’s proving a point. Kisses him until Credence is light headed and drunk from the oxygen deprivation, surely the only reason he doesn’t realize he’s been pushed backwards until the cool tile wall sears at the warm skin of his back, doesn’t recognize the downward path Newt’s hands make until his palms cup the back of his thighs and he hitches Credence’s legs up to his waist.

“ _Mmmf_!”

Newt kisses his through his objection, smiling against his mouth. Credence is too big for this, even as he curls around Newt and makes himself as small as possible, suctioned skin to skin all the places he can manage.

They stumble back out to Newt’s bedroom, and Newt half drops, half throws him onto the mattress, only a little winded, to his credit, and beaming widely. Credence’s skin is hot and soft and a little damp still from the bath and the worn comforter underneath him feels like a sink pit swallowing him whole.

“Fuck, Credence,” Newt breathes, leaning over him, a knee keeping his legs pried apart. “Is it alright for me to have you?”

His hands trace lightly up the insides of Credence’s arms, making him shiver till they reach his wrists and pin him, spread eagle. “Please,” he whimpers, unsure what he’s asking for.

Newt’s mouth is hot and sucking filthy, open kisses across his jaw, down his throat. He sucks a bruise atop the protrusion of Credence’s collarbone as his weight above him gets heavier, more perfect. His hands trace back up Credence’s arms to trace nonsense patterns on his shoulders, following the trail his mouth now makes peppering Credence’s chest. Credence jackknifes into Newt’s promising heat the second he latches onto a nipple -- _who would have known, really?_ \-- and when he feels Newt’s teeth drag against the pebbled nub in an answering grin he can’t help but keen.

A nipple, of all things.

“Love, look at me, yes -- perfect, like that. I want to do something for you, is that alright?”

Credence feels his brow knot up. “O--obviously?” Sometimes Newt was so slow on the uptake. He wiggles a bit underneath Newt to get his attention back where he wants it.

Newt ducks his head back to Credence’s chest, grinning. “Lovely boy,” he trails kisses down his sternum, the top of his stomach. His beard tickles when he verges to the side, bristling at his ribs and making him giggle breathlessly. He moans at the attention Newt lavishes around his navel, bucks up at the pressure when Newt sucks a hickey right where the trail of hair from his belly button thickens to lead lower.

He blinks owlishly at the ceiling. Oh. _Oh._

Newt’s hand strokes him once, twice, three times, firm and purposeful. “Alright, darling?”

“Please, please, please, please --”

His mouth is velvet fire around the very tip of him, and Credence thinks very briefly that he’s going to cry. When Newt’s tongue laves at the head, he thinks maybe he’s just going to die instead.

Newt holds his hips to steady their frantic bucking and sinks lower.

“Newt, god, please, sir --”

One of his hands comes to cup warmly at the tight weight at the base of his length and it feels like -- Newt’s cheeks are all hollowed around him, bobbing up and down.

Credence is glad Newt can’t see him, worried his eyes are crossed. He feels the cells in his body buckling under the feeling of Newt, between his legs, Newt, all his attention on Credence, Newt, Newt’s mouth, Newt’s lips and tongue, Newt’s big, rough hands.

There is a very light, almost negligible, brush between his cheeks as Newt keeps his pace on his cock, hot and tight and unbearably Good. Credence freezes as the pad of Newt’s thumb brushes against his --

“ _Newt_ \--”

Newt groans as Credence comes, the vibrations drilling through his sensitive length and the squishy bits of his insides and the not-so squishy bits that make up most everything else about him. He doesn’t fully remove himself -- his beautiful, swollen, red and panting mouth, oh god, oh god, oh god -- until Credence is soft and twitching and wanting nothing but limbs wrapped around each other, bodies slotted close.

He gets that, because Newt is Good and knows what Credence wants sometimes better than he does, when he isn’t getting it wrong. Newt’s limbs are as heavy and sweaty as his own feel, and they weigh him perfectly into his skin as they twine around him. He grips back, legs and arms all curled around Newt the places they fit. The two of them, together, breathing and alive and _together_.

“Why did we bathe _before_?” Credence mumbles after a minute, tucked under Newt’s chin.

Newt’s whole body shakes with breathless laughter, and Credence grins dopily and tries to bury himself in it, face first.

Newt’s sheets are navy, his comforter is worn and patterned in cream and blue checks, his walls are beige and boring and in this bed that Newt is letting him share, Newt’s limbs pinning him down and sweat cooling sticky between the places they touch, his hair tickling Credence’s face, Newt is his, by some magic, _his_ ; and Credence loves him very much.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content warnings: fairly graphic depictions of a panic attack. Shrodinger's BDSM? Credence is definitely in something like sub-space, but that's the length of it. Metaphors about feelings and self indulgent porn.
> 
> *
> 
> You guys...I had a whole other chapter planned out for this but I have been feeling bad and I just wanted to write some porn. I'm sorry. If you came here for the slow burn in the tags, we've only got a moderately paced simmer and I'm as disappointed in myself as you are. I only managed to save us from a shaving kink this chapter by the skin of my teeth. 
> 
> Being said, because this is not the chapter I originally had planned, I'll likely be adding another chapter to this fic. Thank you to everyone who has read and left me feedback so far, I can't tell you how much it means to me. 
> 
> And hey, if you want to do that again, that would be cool too :) Feedback is always appreciated. Thank you so much for sticking with me!


	6. Part Six

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> See end notes for content warnings

I.

Credence sleeps, except when he can’t. Twice he wakes to face the rise and fall of Newt’s chest. He is very tired, but almost to the point of restlessness. The third time he rouses he tries to roll away from Newt for fear of waking him with his fidgeting, but Newt only half opens a bleary eye and tugs Credence to him with a rough, sloppy grip on his waist.

“ _Mmmffgghh_ ,” Newt groans into the crown of his head.

He is hot and sticky and no little bit uncomfortable, but Newt nuzzles at his too-warm skin, his breath tickling through his hair and his big, rough hands not allowing him to leave his body even though Credence feels a bit like he wants to. Newt wants him here. That’s enough. Newt’s given him enough that he can do that.

Credence drifts between sleep and wakefulness until Newt finally rolls off of him to silence his bedside alarm, blinking and making the soft, unguarded noises of waking.

“Can I make you coffee?” He asks softly when the alarm is off.

Newt has to blink at him for a minute before nodding, hair mussed and a red crease on his cheek. Credence’s chest twists tight.

There’s something that feels illicit about walking through Newt’s house naked as he is, but Credence thinks he might like it, a little. He takes the pot back with careful hands, warm against his palms. Just the heat of it so close and the smell which he’s now unable to separate from Newt wakes him up as he crosses the threshold into the bedroom. Newt is propped against the headboard with his bare legs spread in a V that Credence crawls between, wobbling a bit on his knees, before he hands off the pot. He’s slow settling into Newt’s chest even as he waves Credence towards him while still suctioned to his new caffeine source.

“Is there a reason you don’t drink coffee?” Newt asks after a minute. Credence looks up at the underside of his chin, stops drawing patterns on his chest. Newt’s arm is wrapped around his shoulder, and his calloused fingers drum idly atop his bicep.

“I don’t know. I never thought about it.”

“Would you like to try some?”

“...Is this going to be like the beer?”

Newt snorts before taking another gulp. “Coffee and beer taste different, I promise.” He pauses. “If you try some I’ll buy you something nice today after work.”

Credence pulls away from Newt, sits up on his own and looks down at him closely.

“You’ll try to buy me something nice even if I don’t, though. Right?”

Newt might shrug a little behind his next sip.

“Maybe it will be something _really_ nice.”

“You just -- know you don’t have to.”

Newt’s free hand brushes his arm, his shoulder, tickles the side of his neck to cup his face.

“I want to. Do you want to try the coffee? It won’t actually affect me buying anything for you. No pressure.”

Credence is slow reaching for the pot. He looks at Newt the entire time as he gives it a little sip.

He chokes.

“That’s -- _awful_. Newt, that’s so -- so bad. You drink a pot of that everyday?!” He sputters, all but shoving the offending pot back into Newt’s possession. Newt chuckles as he puts it on the bedside table, leaning forward to kiss the aftertaste from Credence’s mouth.

“This is nice,” he says softly, lips brushing against Credence’s.

“No, it’s so bitter --”

Newt presses their mouths together again before pulling back a little, smiling. “I’m not talking about the coffee.”

“Oh.”

Credence looks up to meet Newt’s eyes -- the nearly translucent eyelashes and the irises like sea glass, nearly washed of any color at all in the dim light as they rove over his face. “That. Yes. Yes. It’s better than the coffee.”

Newt groans, but he’s grinning as he pulls Credence back down flat to the mattress, wrapping his limbs around him and nuzzling at his neck until Credence is giggling breathlessly at the tickle of the bristles of his beard rasping across his skin.

“Lovely, lovely boy,” he coos. “Sweetheart, you’re too good to me.”

“ _Tickles_ \-- Newt, stop, that tickles, please!” He begs between his laughter until Newt stops, giggling himself.

“You reckon the vet could operate without it’s vet today?” He asks, peppering kisses to Credence’s shoulder, his collarbone. One of his hands squeezes at the meatiest give of his rear, and Credence arches into it.

“I -- I wish,” he hammers out, starting to shift and fidget as blood pools in his groin. “Tara would kill you.”

Newt only hums noncommittally, pressed close to Credence’s skin; the vibration goes straight down to his stiffening length like a phantom grip squeezing tight, holding firm. He feels Newt smile at the little juncture where his neck meets his shoulder, and Newt keeps him pressed close despite Credence’s efforts to wiggle back.

“We better be quick then,” he murmurs, too soft for how firmly he starts to grind against Credence.

He chokes out a half-hearted protest as Newt keeps up his pace -- not all that hurried, despite his assertion. Credence might even call it lazy, once his brain can make even simple words again.

“Roll over for me, love.”

Newt ends up doing most of the work to get Credence flat on his belly, which Credence should feel bad about...but Newt’s smiling when he kisses his shoulder, so maybe it’s okay.

He’s slow rocking against Credence, who can feel him everywhere like this. He’s heavy above him, a warm drag between his thighs, the stiff weight throbbing there, slipping past the crease of his entrance.

It’s frustratingly too much one second and not nearly enough another. Credence arches back a bit so Newt is settled more firmly behind him. He only has half an idea what he’s asking for, but --

“Credence, darling, will you --”

“ _Yes_ ,” he pants. “Yes. Tell me what to do.”

Newt stills above him for a moment, long enough for Credence to start to curl into himself, flushing and mortified.

“I’m sorry?”

Newt slips between Credence’s thighs, slick and wet as he was in the car, thick and heavy brushing underneath Credence’s length as he tells him gruffly, “Close your legs. Tight.”

Dumbfounded, Credence does.

“What--”

Then Newt starts to move, and all of Credence’s concentration is on clenching the muscles of his thighs to keep Newt pressed close enough to drag along the underside of his own cock, brush against the tight weight of his balls. Sweat pools behind Credence’s knees, blooms warm in the places where they tangle and brush together, slicks between the points where Newt keeps him pinned to the bed, perfect and Good just like this, all smelling of coffee and sleep-skin.

“I --” Credence doesn’t know what he’s going to say, doesn’t know what he wants to ask for, but Newt _shushes_ him before reaching around to grip at Credence’s length, teasing at the head until Credence keens. He stops his movement behind him, and Credence doesn’t get the chance to protest before Newt fits both of them in his hand, stroking quick and the right side of too-hard.

Credence’s eyes roll back in his head.

“ _Fuck_ \--”

Newt removes his hand suddenly, pinches at his rear with a breathless chuckle.

“Since when does my good boy swear?”

“Newt _please_ \--” he sobs, trying to clench his thighs together to prove his point.

“Can you come soon?”

“ _Yes_ , I’m --”

“Touch yourself, go on. Before I tell you to roll over, alright?”

Credence’s hand flies to his cock before Newt’s done talking, stroking himself quickly. He’s too flustered to match his strokes with Newt’s rhythm, but every now and then they match up and little white stars explode behind Credence’s eyelids.

“You’re so good for me, Credence. Beautiful boy. Tell me when you’re ready.”

“I -- _I_ \--”

Newt bats his hand away, does the work while Credence crests the wave that unfolds warm, loose heat through his body.

“Sweet _Christ_. Roll over, love, please.”

Credence’s thighs are all water as he flops to his back, unable to catch his breath. Even though his eyelids are heavy as lead he can see Newt’s face is wrecked and open as he looks down at him, pumping his own length until his release ribbons Credence’s chest.

It’s quiet.

Newt flops beside him and smooths a shaky, hot hand over his hair and brow with a dopey smile on his face.

“I have this nagging feeling you’re the type to hound me to go into work even if I desperately, desperately don’t want to.”

Credence feels warm from the inside out as he tries to hide his smile in the side of Newt’s neck.

“Oh, we’re feeling bashful _now_?” Newt laughs, rubbing his hands up and down the planes of Credence’s back.

He almost spills it, then. Almost says it.

“You’d be right, though,” Newt sighs. “Do you think we can behave in a shower together?”

There’s probably many loose interpretations of “behave,” but when he and Newt finally make it out of the house, walking to the car hand-in-hand, Credence muses they probably didn’t meet any of them.

*

Tara is short with them the rest of the day in the closest display to pouting Credence has ever seen her show.

“Should I apologize for something?” Credence asks Newt at lunch, unable to look up from his lap. Newt just snorts.

“No, she’s being a brat because she hoped I’d come in early and deal with the techs this morning. I usually do.”

“...Sorry,” Credence mumbles, face on fire.

“I’m rather not,” Newt says lightly. “I’ll tell you what. You can tell her we’ll close up today when you go back up front. That will cheer her up.”

“Before we go shopping?” He asks tentatively. Newt beams at him.

“Yes. Do you have anything you want to look for?”

Credence purses his lips when he looks back up to Newt’s face, unimpressed.

“One day,” Newt muses lightly, “you will be so bossy I won’t know what to do with you.”

“That...doesn’t bother you?”

Newt cocks his head to look at him curiously, absently clicking his pen.

“What would?”

“Me -- being like that. To you.”

“Who knows? Maybe I’d like it. If you felt good being a pernicious little thing how could that bother me?”

Their lunch hour is almost up. Credence doesn’t know how to answer something so -- sweet? Kind? Strange? Something that makes his skin feel tight, thin and close to the muscle and thrum of blood underneath, so he stands to start clearing off Newt’s desk from his lunch.

Newt catches his wrist as he dumps the garbage into the bin next to his desk.

“I -- the way you are now makes me happy, Credence. I enjoy it. You. But,” he holds both Credence’s hands in his, “look at me if you can, please. What I mean is I will feel that way no matter how you change or act or if you don’t.”

“You -- too. I think that, too. About you.”

Newt looks over Credence’s shoulder to the closed door behind him before rising to press a little kiss to the corner of his mouth. He pulls back grinning.

“Let’s see if you still feel that way after I wear you out tonight.”

Credence stumbles reaching for the door, nearly eating it altogether. Newt tries unsuccessfully to hide his chortling laughter as he wraps his arms around Credence from behind, pressing his face into his shoulder.

“At the store, love.”

“I-- I know that.”

Newt peppers kisses in the soft hollow behind the shell of his ear before taking the lobe between his teeth and yanking lightly.

“I know you do.”

*

Newt doesn't let go of his hand as they walk into the department store, warm and smelling of leather and floor polish and a few things Credence can only identify as “expensive.” There are people milling about aimlessly, and even if Credence likes the warm cage of Newt’s fingers around his own, he feels a bit reflexively like he should pull away.

“Do you want to look at clothes first?”

“Uhm. Okay.”

“Don’t be afraid to tell me if I pick up something you don’t like. I want you to like it, first. And if being colorblind wasn’t enough I just have plain bad taste --” Newt pauses, brings Credence’s hand up to kiss the back of it. “Bad except in men, I mean.”

Credence chokes a bit on an invisible something lodged suddenly in his throat, but he squeezes Newt’s hand when he guides them forward and his brain starts to function again.

“...Modesty says I would wear black pants and brown shoes. I don’t know how much help I’ll be.”

Credence doesn’t mention how long it took him to realize why that was a bad thing.

“What a pair we are,” Newt grins, navigating past a display of soft-looking women’s blouses. Warm, languid heat fills Credence’s chest, likely from all the blood in his head rushing to flood there, pulled like a magnet by his heavily _thump-thumping_ heart and leaving him pleasantly light-headed. _A pair they make_. Together. Newt, somehow made better with Credence near, rather than worse off. Better like how Newt makes Credence feel and act and be.

“What about these?”

Credence snaps his attention back to Newt beside him, lifting a soft, robin’s egg blue sweater like nothing Credence would ever think to pick out for himself.

“The color is -- pretty.”

“It’s soft,” Newt offers neutrally. Credence is slow releasing his hand to rub the sweater between his fingers.

“ _Oh_.”

It is soft. It’s also forty-five dollars. He drops it as if burned by the cool, downy cotton.

“What’s wrong?” Newt frowns, watching Credence try to fold it back in the weird way all the others were, as if to fool someone that Credence had never touched it.

“It’s expensive,” he mutters, ears hot. “Forty-five dollars for one shirt --”

“Is something I’m more than willing to spend on you and then some.”

Credence doesn’t want to argue and ruin their night when Newt is trying to be nice. He bites his cheek and looks down at his feet.

“Hey,” Newt says softly, grabbing his chin and raising his face to look him in the eye. “I won’t show you anything I can’t or don’t want to buy you. Will you trust me on that, Credence? Have I ever lied to you before?”

“I -- it _is_ soft,” Credence says finally. Newt’s face splits into a beautiful smile, all teeth and infections feeling, before taking Credence’s face between both of his hands to kiss him on the mouth, heedless of other people around able to see them like this.

Credence’s brain short circuits. His whole body is hot, numb fire. _In public in public in public_.

“Are you alright, darling?”

“Y-yeah. Yes, I mean. Yes, sir. Mhm.”

He winces as Newt looks at him, brows raised. _Overkill_.

“That one’s too big,” he says, gesturing to the shirt in Newt’s hands to change the subject. Newt only blinks at him before picking up the size down.

“We’ll take both to try, then, alright?”

He shrugs and lets himself be walked through the entire men’s section -- pants and jeans and more different types of shirts than Credence thought any one human could keep straight: long sleeved and button downs and sweaters, all of which Newt waits patiently for him to weigh in on after he picks them up, even when Credence has to take what feels like ages to drum up an opinion on. Soft, slinky, too stiff, color that makes him look peaked and ill, too hot, too thick, just something he doesn’t like. They make it to the fitting room with no less than twenty different items (most of which Newt insists on bringing more than one size of) after what feels like hours of walking and idle chatter between them; about other people they pass, why they say white shouldn’t be worn after labor day (neither of them have a good answer), what colorblindness is like after the third time Credence is asked to describe a shade of red, this time on a button down.

“What do you even see if it’s not red? You can see some color -- does it just look...black, or something?”

“Hm...it’s not quite black, exactly, but close. I see mostly blues and yellows, everything else is really dim.”

“...You...how do you drive then?” Credence asks, a hand in the crook of Newt’s elbow and a frown heavy on his face. “That’s -- you could hurt yourself!”

Newt nudges Credence’s hip with his own. “I’ve gotten us safely to our destination every time so far.”

“ _Newt_.”

He shrugs. “I just see which one is dimmer and go based on that, it’s been alright for the most part up to now. I know the top is stop and the bottom is go. But, now that you mention it; I went with my brother to Miami for a conference once -- their streetlights are horizontal, did you know that? I’m still not allowed to drive in the state of Florida, and that was...almost five years ago, now.”

Credence comes to a full stop, mouth agape and horrified.

Newt looks at him quizzically over his shoulder before rolling his eyes and dragging him forward. “Darling, if it will make you feel better to get a license and chauffeur us around yourself, I promise I will let you use my car to do it. We can get you lessons if you want. But let’s go try these on, alright? Don’t start worrying now.”

The dressing room feels unbearably small when Credence steps into it, but Newt’s hands are on him the minute the door closes and they keep him small enough they fit in there together, somehow.

“What do you want to try first?”

“You pick. Please.”

Newt hums before picking up a pair of dark wash jeans. “These? You picked these out yourself, let’s start with this.”

Credence shucks his scrubs off and his shoes with only a little stumbling before reaching for the jeans. He doesn’t want to waste any of Newt’s time so he’s quick yanking them up and struggling with the --

Struggling with the zip? He frowns, looking down at them. The jeans won’t button around his waist.

“What?” He says aloud, staring into the smudged mirror with his hands still clasped on the waistband.

Newt watches him silently as Credence slides the things back down before holding the tag to his face. Thirty thirty seven, like the pairs he has at home.

“I brought another size,” Newt says finally. Credence’s face is on fire. He doesn’t even know what size he is. _So stupid_.

He lets Newt guide the new pair up his legs and button them for him -- a much better fit.

“Do you like them?”

“Do you?”

He rests his head on Credence’s shoulder, watching him in the mirror from behind him. One of his hands is flat to Credece’s belly -- maybe it is bigger? He peers a bit closer in his reflection. How much is bigger or different or changed about him, and since when? Of all his flaws even That Woman wouldn’t accuse him of vanity; maybe he doesn’t look any different at all.

“I very much do.”

“I’m sorry I didn’t -- know my size,” he finishes in a rush, looking down at his feet.

“I’m sure it was your size before,” Newt shrugs. Credence’s cheeks are pink. The scrubs he wears all have elastic waistbands, and his other clothes are worn and stretched out to shapelessness, so it’s not completely impossible he hadn’t noticed gaining some weight.

“I…”

“I think you look wonderful,” Newt presses a kiss to the side of his neck before pulling away to peel the jeans off of him. “It makes me happy when we eat together and find new things you like, and I’m happy knowing you’re eating more often. The way you looked before made me happy, and the way you look now, too...knowing that I can look at you and touch you how I like,” he finishes softly, looking up at Credence from where he’s knelt on the floor in front of his feet.

Credence doesn’t know what to say. He dares to run his fingers through Newt’s mop of curls as he leans forward to press a smiling kiss to Credence’s thigh.

“Lift your feet out for me, love -- thank you. I think these are going in our keep stack.”

They go through two more pairs of jeans and a nice pair of charcoal trousers before Newt pulls a shirt up off of the pile on the fitting room bench.

“Uhm -- I don’t want that one,” Credence says carefully. Newt just raises a brow.

“It’s red -- I don’t, uhm. Want to wear anything you can’t see, so --”

“ _Oh_.”

Credence can’t catch his breath for a minute for all the little, featherlight kisses Newt peppers on his face.

“Sweet -- you’re so sweet for me, love. Thank you. That’s so -- you’re so good for me, alright, if you’re -- thank you.”

All his shirts end up shades of blue or grey when they leave the dressing room. (Credence might wear black pants and brown shoes but he hasn’t mustered up the courage for yellow.) They stop for packs of thick socks and underwear Newt gladly picks out for him before Newt leads him to the center most part of the store where women in clacking heels wave perfume samples in their faces.

“Would you like anything here? For the coffee, maybe?”

“Uhm…”

Newt studies his face for a moment.

“I wear this one,” he says, pointing at a small, stout bottle declaring “Hugo Boss” in red ink.

“I like it,” Credence murmurs, shifting his hold on the clothes in his hands. Newt kisses his cheek.

“Let’s get you something nice you can wear and feel good. Do you want a bottle of what I have, if you like it?”

He frowns. That’s Newt’s smell, Credence doesn’t want to think of anything else but Newt when he’s near it. It’s Special when he’s in one of Newt’s sweatshirts at his house, wrapped up in one of his blankets, face buried in one of his pillows. Like he’s borrowing it, being allowed a secret pleasure. He couldn’t try to fit his body in that smell like he owned it.

“I like it on you,” he tries to explain. “I want it to -- I just want to think of you when I smell it, not me.”

Newt exhales shakily beside him. “I wonder if you're real a lot, you know?”

Credence thinks thats a rhetorical question, just tries to brush their shoulders together in answer.

He has a headache within smelling three bottles of cologne displayed on the counter. Newt hums thoughtfully each time, like every grimacing refusal is somehow constructive, before picking up a tall, dark bottle.

“This one is lighter, what do you think?”

Jo Malone Oud and Bergamot, the bottle says. Credence doesn’t know what any one of those words mean, much less smell like, but...apparently it’s nice. Not too heavy, too spicy, too sweet -- too anything. Soft and a bit sharp, like how Credence thinks might smell good on Newt’s pillow overtop the richer cedar smell he wears.

“I think we have a winner, don’t we?”

“If -- if you like it, then. Yes.”

“I believe, to use your turn of phrase, I like what you like, sweet thing.”

II.

Modesty makes him his favorite frozen lasagna the night after he and Newt go shopping, and for a minute he feels reflexive fear that he's forgotten someone’s birthday.

“Thank you,” he says uncertainly as she sits across from him at their table.

“I wanted to say...sorry. For not waking you up last week.”

“You know that’s not your fault,” he mutters, pushing a forkful around his plate. “I’m not mad. I wasn’t ever mad at you.”

“I still feel bad. You would still feel bad if we were in different places. I was just running late myself I didn’t even think about...you.”

“It’s fine, Modesty. Really.”

“Newt isn’t mad at me?” She asks softly after a minute. “The people at your work?”

“No. Newt wouldn’t be mad at you for that. He -- uhm. He wanted to buy you something at the store the other night but I didn’t know what, uhm, smell you liked. Or your size. Or...anything you would like. So...I’m sorry. For that. But he said if you ever want to, uhm. Come with us.”

Modesty is looking at him, mouth agape and fork still in midair.

“Or he said he could just give you his card, if you want to walk around alone for a bit --”

She drops her fork.

“Credence. W-- _what_?”

“Uhm.”

“What kind of boyfriend --”

He drops his own fork, puts his unbearably hot face in his hands.

“Please don’t say that. It’s so _weird_ when you say it --”

Modesty drums her fingers listlessly on the table.

“He must...love you a lot, I guess,” she says finally.

“O-oh my god. Modesty, wh-- shut _up_ ,” he falters. He thinks he’s having a stroke.

“Maybe you won’t lose your job over this,” she muses. “If he’s willing to drop this kind of cash on you. On _me_. Maybe he’s --”

“I’m going to cry,” he says baldly.

“Not over lasagna!”

“Can we please talk about _anything_ else?”

“...Okay. Okay. I went by the Y today, they said I got that lacrosse coaching job.”

“You could have said that first,” he tells her, exasperated. “When do you start?”

“I need to go in for orientation next Wednesday.”

“Do you need a ride?”

“Tina can probably take me,” she shrugs. “Why? Did Newt buy you a car, too?”

He glares at her, then down at his empty plate -- when had he eaten all of that?

“He said I could get a license. That he would help me got one, if I wanted.” He takes a swig of his water. “He’s colorblind, you know?”

She frowns as he cuts himself another small piece from the pan.

“How does he drive, then?”

“Apparently the state of Florida had the same concern,” he says darkly.

Modesty raises her eyebrows wordlessly, but she doesn’t press and lets him help her clean up after they've finished eating. Credence loves his sister more than anything. She never pushes him further than he can go; not really.

Before she heads to the bathroom to shower, Credence wraps his arms around her, pulls her close and breathes in the strawberry smell of her hair for a minute.

“Thank you, Modesty.”

She returns the hug, sighing.

“I know. I know. I’m awesome.”

*

Credence scrounges up the courage to wear his cologne to work Friday. He’s in the little hallway behind the reception desk with the patient files when Newt comes to a full stop in front of him where he’d been brushing by.

“What’s this?” Newt grins, delighted, as he buries his face into Credence’s neck.

“Is it -- it’s good?”

“Mhmmm,” Newt hums, running his warm hands up and down Credence’s sides. “Maybe this was a mistake. How am I supposed to work like this?”

“The...the threat of Tara?”

He groans. The vibration on his skin carries straight down to ripple pleasure in low in his belly.

“Where would I be without you keeping me in line?”

“Oh, hell _yes_!” Tara whoops behind them. Credence freezes -- maybe he’s never been pliable or human in his entire life. Newt just rolls his eyes as he pulls away from his wooden, unmoving body.

“Can we help you?”

“You already have. I just won the pool with the techs on who would catch you two doing something cute first.”

“C-cute,” Credence chokes.

“It’s only fair you split the pot, then, isn’t that right?” Newt shoots back coolly.

“Not on your life, Boss-Man. Hand me that file behind you if you aren’t otherwise occupied with my receptionist. Joshua Hendricks -- yes, thanks. Some of us have jobs to do out front.”

“I’m sorry,” Credence mumbles, mortified and unsure which one of them he’s speaking to.

“Don’t let Newt try and blame you for his _untoward, lecherous_ behavior,” Tara smirks. Newt flips her the bird before patting Credence on the shoulder and heading to the lobby.

“I -- promise this won’t, uhm. Affect my work. We don’t -- we never. Here.”

Tara grins at him, grips his bicep as they walk back to the desk.

“I know. Newt knows I would flay him alive.”

Credence thinks to Newt’s office, on his lap, the first time he felt Newt’s hand on him.

“That would be bad,” Credence says weakly.

“For him, yes.”

“Do you...mind?” He asks after Joshua Hendricks has been set up in Exam One, and Margaret Catwood has perched herself on the desk, batting at some of the pens they kept in a cup.

“Mm?”

“Uhm. My -- someone I know. Said it was...inappropriate.”

Tara eyes him shrewdly.

“Newt is good people. You’re a good kid. Will I rag on him endlessly for being a perverted old man? Yes. But no, it doesn’t bother me. You work with each other. So what?”

“You...you’re good people, too,” he mutters, staring at his keyboard.

Tara puts her hand on top of his briefly. Margaret Catwood knocks the pen cup over, and she winds her still-bony body around Credence’s ankles when he moves to clean it up.

“Drippy’s going to get jealous of you soon, you know. She likes you more than me, now.”

Tara picks Margaret Catwood up, cradles her mewling body to her chest.

“That’s not possible.”

“I know my cats,” Tara sniffs. Credence doesn’t know what to say, but he’s smiling for some reason when he looks back to his computer screen.

Joshua Hendricks and his iguana, Little Richard, have left and Newt is tending to twin chinchillas (Muppet and Papa Smurf) before Tara speaks again.

“To be fair -- it does smell nice.”

Credence drops the phone receiver in his hand.

*

“It’s Jacob’s birthday soon. Queenie always does a big dinner for it. Would you like to come?”

“You would...want me to?”

“I would.”

Newt’s head is in his lap, and _The Two Towers_ is playing softly on his television. There’s Chinese takeout still laid out on the table, and a little box of cannolis Newt grabbed at the grocery store bakery on their way home when they stopped for beer. He liked them more than he or Newt expected, and he reaches for another one before he answers; a few crumbs fall in Newt’s hair even though he’s careful.

“Uhm. Okay.”

“Only if you want to,” Newt says after a pause.

“I...want to go with you.”

“It’s Sunday next. I’ll pick you up that afternoon? Unless you want to stay the night Saturday --”

“Yes, please.”

Newt smiles up at him as he finishes the sweet. Credence’s stomach seizes up on itself looking down at his face. He’d thought about it since Newt first gave him a bath, but he’s never been brave enough to bring it up in case Newt had changed his mind. But...Newt likes to know what Credence wants. He knows that, now.

“Uhm. Can we -- I. I wanttoshaveyou,” he finishes in a breathless rush. Newt exhales in a big huff and sits up slowly.

“Anything you want,” he says quietly, and Credence thinks it’s about more than one thing.

Newt pauses the movie to guide him to his bathroom.

"Now?" Credence asks, more squeak than query. Newt raises an eyebrow.

"I can't say I'm a big believer in delayed gratification," he muses. "Unless you don't --"

"I do! I do," he says, afraid Newt will change his mind. He all but suctions himself to Newt's back as they pass through Newt's bedroom and into the master bath. Newt sets out his razor and shaving cream quietly, and for a minute both of them just look at them on his sink.

“Is it alright? Really?”

“Where do you want me, baby?”

He gulps, reflexively flinches a bit. _Baby_. That’s the worst one yet.

“I...where will you be comfortable?”

This was such a bad idea. Why did he suggest it? What if he ruins Newt’s face?

Newt sits on the little space between the two sinks, swinging his legs idly against the cabinets underneath. Credence reaches for a washcloth and runs it under warm water before wringing it out and pressing it to the bottom half of Newt’s face.

“Too hot?”

“Perfect. ‘S’nice.”

Credence lays a towel on his lap before reaching towards the shaving cream. It says lavender and sandalwood on the bottle, and it’s soft and plush between his hands as he emulsifies it with some water from the tap. He lathers it through the bristles of Newt’s beard with gentle fingers.

“You look old.”

He reaches a hand out to pinch at Credence’s rear.

“Then you should respect your elders.” He ducks in for a kiss heedless of the foam that ends up in Credence’s mouth and nose, leaving him sputtering.

“Hey!”

“I can’t help it, I’m too smitten.”

Credence snorts, rubbing more cream into his beard.

“Smitten,” he repeats, unimpressed.

“Enamored. Besotted. Charmed. Utterly taken --”

“S-stop it,” he mutters, plugging in the razor and focusing on the soft hum it starts to make. He used a regular stick razor on himself, and the three spinning discs on Newt’s are strange and distracting as they start to spin. He’s extra careful fitting himself between Newt’s knees and pressing the head to his jaw.

Credence holds his breath during the first pass. Newt is so close; warm and smelling so good and receptive to Credence being in his space. No matter how often they are together it feels fresh and new and burns a live wire under his skin when he’s allowed so near. He feels lightheaded when he finally exhales and Newt grins up at him, eyes heavy and pupils fat black and shining.

“Feels good.”

“Yes,” Credence agrees nonsensically. The next few passes are equally slow, labored. When he reaches Newt’s chin Credence realizes he’s hard in his pants and nearly stumbles back.

Newt’s hands shoot out, catch him before he can get too far away.

“Shh, no, come here.”

“I’m sorry --” He says, face on fire. Why is he even acting like this? He shaves nearly every day, he’s never reacted like it was anything -- anything sexual. What kind of deviant is he?

“What are you sorry for?” Newt asks lowly, guiding one of Credence’s hands to the tenting in his own pants. “Do I seem upset to you?”

“No,” he breathes. _Oh god, oh god, oh god_. Credence grips at the swollen length hot under his hand, marvels at the responsive twitching that -- that Credence caused. He did. Newt impossibly _likes_ Credence touching him. He thumbs over the head through Newt’s sweatpants, a wet spot blooming where his touch brushes.

“Darling, as much as I want you to continue that -- _ah_ \-- train of thought, _Christ_ , Credence -- _immediately_ , I can’t go around with a beard on only half my face.”

Slowly, Credence lets Newt’s cock free and goes back to work. Both of their breathing is suddenly the only thing Credence can hear in the room; even the drone of the razor is silent. It’s just breathing and the thump of his pulse close to his skin.

“Thank you,” he tells Newt shyly as he pats on aftershave. “For letting me…” Touch you? It’s more than that. “Take care of you. I mean, I know I can’t take...care of you like you do me. But. I --”

Newt pulls him flush to his front. His jaw is soft and silky when he trails up Credence’s neck, behind his ear, his own jaw. The smell of the cream and the aftershave heady at his nose leave Credence a bit drunk feeling, like his knees aren’t entirely solid, and maybe his brain isn’t either.

“Let me take you to bed?”

Credence runs his hands and mouth all over Newt’s newly smooth jaw when they make it to the mattress, new to him now like he’s not even touched Newt at all, before. Newt lets him get on top and explore to his heart’s content the lines and swells and planes of his face, his body.

He doesn’t know what he’s doing when he makes it down the trail of hair on the soft roundness of Newt’s belly, but apparently this act requires little finesse as Newt mewls and moans into Credence’s touch, his mouth. Maybe Newt just has low standards -- but he doesn’t want to think about that, just now.

It’s odd -- not exactly comfortable, but Credence loves it, the feeling like Newt can’t be any closer than he is now. The weight of him and heat so heavy on his tongue and the taste of his skin makes Credence’s toes curl; for a minute he thinks he might cry it’s so much _good_.

“I think,” Newt says breathlessly, after, “I’m going to have you shave me from now on.”

III.

The night before Jacob’s party, Newt rubs knots out of Credence’s back on his bed. He warms a rich, woody smelling oil between his rough hands before kneading them into Credence’s skin, his body grown loose enough Credence feels a bit like he’s half out of its constraints altogether.

It’s magical. Newt surely knows this, which is why he waits until Credence is half puddle of goo before he starts making his case.

“I want to get you something.”

“You always want to get me something,” Credence mumbles, too loose to speak coherently. It sounds like marbles are rolling around in his mouth.

He groans as Newt pointedly works on unfurling muscle low on his back.

“Christmas is coming up, so I have more of an excuse than normal,” Newt shoots back primly. “And it’s -- for me, too.”

“...For you?”

Newt presses a wet, open mouthed kiss to the nape of his neck, sweeps his tongue over the scrape his teeth leave.

“Do I have to justify,” he rasps close to Credence’s skin, “every purchase I make as ultimately being for me to get you on board? Is that what it takes to avoid a fight?”

“Maybe,” Credence grins, unsure if Newt can see it. “What...what is it?”

“A phone --”

“No.”

“...Even I wasn’t expecting you to refuse me flat out like that, I’ll be honest.”

“It’s too much, Newt.”

“Maybe I don’t want Modesty to see any of our racy pictures. I’m sparing her innocent eyes.”

“We -- our what?” Credence sputters. “We don’t have any of those.”

He can feel Newt’s weight on top of him jostle a bit as he chuckles, but Credence feels a frown start to pucker between his brows. He shifts so he can turn his head and look up at Newt.

“Do you want some?”

Newt freezes, and Credence has studied Newt close and long enough to recognize his tells, but his face is something completely new to Credence now.

“You do?” He presses.

“I -- d...you surprise me with everything that comes out of your mouth, Credence. Somehow I’m never prepared for it. I think I had a cardiac incident just now.”

“I mean. I don’t know -- why wou’d want...but if you do, I mean. I don’t mind --”

“Credence, _please_.” Newt speaks like there’s a hand around his throat in a vise. He takes a minute before running his fingers along the line of Credence’s shoulders idly.

“You have no problem with nude pictures but won’t let me get you a phone.”

“I have a phone.”

“Do you know what I want for Christmas, Credence?”

He sighs. “Newt, please --”

“Roll over for me.”

Even if he really wanted to, Credence doubts he could say no to Newt when he uses The Voice that replaces his blood with gravel which rattles in his veins and makes his body thrum from the inside out like a plucked string.

“What I want,” he says, slow and careful, “is to be able to call you whenever I want to hear your voice. I want to send you pictures of things I see that remind me of you or I think you’ll like, or text you when I can’t sleep and not worry about waking Modesty up or worry about...censoring them. And maybe I do want to see your beautiful face and yo--”

“Please don’t say it,” Credence begs him.

“Would it be so bad?” Newt asks him softly. “Are you worried I’ll call too much --”

“Will you kiss me, please?”

Newt is complying before he’s even finished asking. Credence steels himself in the familiar burn of it.

“Yes,” he says against the seal of their mouths, because it’s easier to give in skin-to-skin. “Okay. Yes, if you want. Anything you want.”

Newt beams at him, then kisses his cheek noisily.

“Thank you, my love.”

“I think that’s what I’m supposed to say.”

“Would you like to come with me to pick it out?”

Credence thinks about it, traces patterns on Newt’s thighs underneath the legs of his boxers. He swallows.

“Would you like to surprise me?”

Newt pinches his nose.

“You know me too well. I do, but if you’d be more comfortable going with me we can do that.”

“It’s your Christmas gift.”

He sighs, nuzzling underneath Credence’s jaw.

“I will remind you of that,” he tells Credence quietly.

“I don’t know what that means,” Credence says honestly, “but please kiss me again.”

*

“Thank you,” Credence murmurs as he buttons the last button on Newt’s shirt and starts to tuck it into the waistband of his trousers.

“Thank _you_ , sweet boy.” Newt ducks to kiss at Credence’s hair. “Jacob can’t take the piss on me not being presentable, now that I know everything matches and is buttoned up right.”

“You just don’t take the time for yourself,” Credence says before he really thinks about it, focused on crouching in front of Newt’s feet and slipping on his loafers.

Newt snorts above him, a hand carding through his hair. “Is that your professional diagnosis?”

He freezes, a hand still cupping Newt’s calf.

“I -- I didn’t mean…”

“It’s alright, Credence. I’m only teasing. Jacob’s going to love you, though. He’s under the impression someone needs to keep me in line.”

Credence flushes as he rises, clenching and flexing his fists by his sides reflexively. He’s seen Queenie plenty; Tina’s been inviting him and Modesty over for Passover the past three years and birthdays between, though Queenie’s always been closer to Modesty seemingly by default. Tina was more than willing to allow Modesty to take her place when Queenie asked for someone to go get her nails done with, or walk around the mall where Queenie seemingly knew everyone customer and employee alike, or even just loiter at the hair salon where she worked. Modesty was more than willing to sweep hair and wash towels if it got her a free haircut. Jacob, though, he’s only seen in passing by some reason or another.

“How long have you been friends?”

“Remember when I told you I wasn’t allowed to drive in Miami?”

Credence’s stomach sinks. Does he have to relive his imagined panic all over again? His face must give it away; Newt reaches out and laces their fingers together as he continues.

“Well on my way back, I’m not having a great day -- indefinite license suspension will do that to you. Theseus had already left on his flight back to Ngorongoro --”

“Uhm.”

“Remind me to tell you about it sometime, darling. Anyway, I’m waiting in the airport and I see Jacob, looking equally miserable waiting for the same flight. I don’t think anything of it, really, until we land back in the city and our luggage gets all mixed up. I try and switch them out, I go up to him asking to change suitcases. I take him off guard, though. He’s fresh out of the Navy, right back his first day from Iraq, and he spooks like a horse. He punches me right here,” he points at his left eye. “I bruise for weeks after, literally. He hits me so hard -- Credence, it’s alright, don’t look like that. I’m fine now. But I have never felt so blindsided in my entire god-fearing life. I fall over, hit my head on the floor so hard I go unconscious and get a concussion. I wake up in the hospital, though, and guess who’s there eating my applesauce?”

Credence feels for the first time in his life very literally like his jaw is on the floor.

“You...are friends after he sent you to the hospital?”

“He felt very bad about it, after,” Newt says reasonably. “I mean. Not immediately after. He immediately blamed me. But eventually he felt able to take some responsibility for his part.”

“I don’t know what to say,” Credence tells him honestly.

Newt kisses his temple. “You can think about how dumb your boyfriend is in the car, I’m sure you’ll come up with something. You always do.”

He lets Newt wrap a thick, fleece scarf around his neck and the lower half of his face before they walk to the car. Fat snowflakes dust the dead rose bushes outside Newt’s house, coat the brick pathway leading down from his sunroom in a fine, crunching slickness. Credence can only smell the crispness of the cold, clean air overtop Newt’s cologne laid through in the thick fabric of the scarf.

“We’ll have to get you some boots soon,” Newt says happily as he locks the door. “And a nice coat, even if you look good in mine.”

Credence’s toes curl inside his new, warm socks. He grabs Newt’s hand and squeezes.

“I am. Happy today -- everyday. Uhm, I mean, most days, anyway. But...today, especially.”

“...I can’t tell you how much I hope this dinner is short so I can take you back home,” Newt murmurs against the skin on the back of his hand when he raises it to kiss at Credence’s knuckles.

Newt turns the heat on full blast when they’re sat in the car and waits for it to warm up before backing out of the driveway.

“I know you and Modesty probably do something with Tina for Hanukkah, but...would you feel comfortable coming around for Christmas? You and Modesty both, if you like. I’ll check and make sure we don’t plan anything on the same day.”

“...You won’t be busy with your brother or something?”

“I don’t like to fly home every year, and Theseus does even less than I do. Have you ever been to Hertfordshire in December? Utter, complete misery. Dreary, horrible, miserable misery. I did my filial duties last year, though, so I have earned a Christmas off.”

“If you don’t mind,” Credence says slowly. “I think it would be. Uhm. Good. Nice. I’d like it.”

Newt beams at him, and keeps grinning to himself until they reach the stoplight leading out from his subdivision.

“The light is red,” Credence says. He’s getting in the habit of it, now, and can’t make himself stop even if it leaves his ears hot and his stomach in knots every time he catches himself doing it. “Uhm. Sorry. Again.”

Newt just snorts, nudges his knee before putting his hand back on the gearshift.

“Don’t be sorry. Safety first.”

He’s already accelerating to make the turn when Credence blurts: “It’s green now.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content Warnings: Brief, supportive, and non-fetish-y talk about weight gain. Mild driving/car anxiety. My omnipresent shaving kink come to light. (You are welcome for that one, Xan.)
> 
> Hello again :) I've missed writing this fic since life and other projects put it on the back burner. Thank you for all the patience and support y'all have given me while I got my act together. Thank you additionally for your patience as I'm very rusty this chapter with these boys :') 
> 
> Anyway! You know that part in the beginning of a relationship where all you're doing is necking and bumping uglies? Well now Credence does, too. ;p Some semblance of plot will return eventually.
> 
> Also, that story about the streetlights in Miami is mostly true -- my best friend's dad didn't get his license taken away, but it was close enough he doesn't even risk it now; she drives, instead. Miami is a dangerous place. 
> 
> Thanks for reading with me this far! Feedback is always appreciated. One more chapter to go, then a little short something down the line, maybe, in the same 'verse. 
> 
> <3 <3 <3


	7. Part Seven

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> See end notes for content warnings.

I.

Jacob shakes Credence’s hand but eyes him warily as he crosses the threshold into his home. Credence doesn’t think he looks like someone who would punch a stranger in the face.

“Whatever Newt said about me, forget it,” he says in lieu of a greeting.

“Uhm.”

“Jacob, Christ, let us get through the door first,” Newt gripes, one hand at the small of Credence’s back.

“Jacob? Are they here?”

“Nah, sweetheart, just talking to myself,” Jacob calls over his shoulder as he moves aside to allow them in proper. Newt doesn’t take his shoes off, and Credence stops himself where he’s trying to wiggle out of his next to the door. Close save.

Behind Jacob, Queenie floats out of the kitchen and down the hall. Her curly blonde hair is golden in the warm light of Jacob’s home, and her soft pink dress sways and moves a bit even when she is still. She smells like sugared rosewater and the chemically tinge of dye and peroxide from her salon when she hugs him, and Credence tries to not tense up in her slim arms. It’s easier than he remembers, whatever that means. He is pretty sure it is a good thing, and something that would make Newt happy. That’s good.

Newt kisses her cheek after she releases Credence, and it is quiet.

“Well I ain’t about to kiss either one of you saps, so let’s not stand around and wait for it. Come on, close the door, you animals, you’re letting all the cold air in.”

“Please, Jacob. Have mercy on Credence and scale back your charm,” Newt says drily, rolling his eyes and clapping Jacob on the shoulder as he passes.

“Let me go grab the rolls out of the oven, then we can eat, alright?” Queenie is smiling at Credence, but stops herself with her hand raised halfway to his elbow. He appreciates it. “I remembered you liked that stuffed chicken we had for Modesty’s birthday last year, right? I made it again, I hope that’s alright. You don’t have to eat it if you don’t want to, though. We can make you something else.”

“That is...very nice, thank you.” Credence forgets how different Tina and Queenie are, sometimes. Jacob leads them into the living room, which is about the same size as Newt’s, but feels smaller and fuller by all the photos and knickknacks and signs of living and use in it. Their entire house smells like butter and warm sugar, done up in rich creams and browns so it feels like there’s low candlelight burning throughout even when there is none. The leather couch underneath him is supple and worn soft with use, and Newt slings an arm around his shoulders and holds him close to his side like Credence has a place of belonging on it, with Newt, like he fits in with all the other clearly well-loved things in their home.

It’s nice. He’s more comfortable than he expected.

“I promised Credence you’d make that almond cake, I hope you didn’t make a liar of me.”

Jacob rolls his eyes. “All you use Queenie and me for is food.” He turns to Credence, eyebrows raised expectantly. “I bet he doesn’t ever even feed you. Does he feed you? You’re so scrawny.”

“I am...bigger than before?”

Newt huffs beside him. “Even we can navigate the takeout menu, fuck you very much.”

Jacob groans. “You can’t build a relationship on takeout, you idiot, the hell is wrong with you? That’s why you and Tina --”

Queenie clears her throat loudly from the doorway. Newt is very still beside Credence, and Jacob looks like he’s got one foot on a hissing landmine -- like the movie he and Newt watched last week.

“Uhm. Wh-where is Tina?”

Queenie stands behind Jacob, rubbing at his shoulders. She is looking above Credence’s head when she answers, her smile tight.

“She...did not want to be here, tonight.”

Credence’s stomach is ice cold, and Newt’s arm is heavy around his shoulders. There is a picture of Tina and Queenie on the end table beside him from after Tina’s graduation, made-up and smiling, their brightly colored drinks clinking together. Tina’s nails are polished and shiny in the picture around her glass.

Credence got her a manicure set once; her birthday is only a few days off from Modesty’s, and they got the same gift more often than not. It was a sturdy little plastic bag with orange sticks and a pink nail file, a bottle of lotion and two other strange tools Credence couldn’t even begin to guess their use. He picked out two bottles of polish alongside; a glittery silver for Modesty, a rich looking navy for Tina. She’d smiled and thanked him, but the next week Modesty’s nails had been painted blue.

Tina hates nail polish. Queenie probably made her paint them in the picture, but she couldn’t make her come tonight.

“I’m sorry.”

Newt stops him when he tries to rise, his ears hot and buzzing.

“What are you sorry for?” Jacob says evenly. One of his hands is locked with Queenie’s, resting on his shoulder. He doesn’t look mad.

Credence can’t make himself look to Newt.

“Is it because I’m here? I -- I’ll go, if you want her to come,” he mumbles.

“Tina has always been a bit moody,” Queenie shrugs. “You can’t put thirty seven years of behavior on your shoulders, sweetheart.”

Newt brushes his thumb along Credence’s knuckles. “Everyone here wants you to be,” he says quietly.

“Listen, unless Newt accidentally gives me -- what was it? Amorophine? Apomorphine? Again, I’ll be alive for my next birthday and maybe she’ll come around by then."

“For the last time, Jacob, that was an honest mistake. If you hadn’t been digging in my drawers for an Excedrin because _you_ got pickled the night before, you wouldn’t have ingested two emetics dosed for a Neapolitan Mastiff.”

“Emetics?”

“Puke inducers!” Jacob cries. “I was throwing up for three days!”

“Credence, don’t listen to this slander against my good name.”

“Let’s save the vomit-talk for a time when we aren’t about to eat, yes?” Queenie suggests delicately, but there’s no argument in it. Jacob kisses the side of her mouth after he rises, one hand on her small waist and murmuring something Credence guesses is an apology.

“For the record,” Newt says primly, rising to his feet and still holding Credence’s hand, “Apomorphine is hardly fatal.”

“You can’t even match your shirt to your pants, how would you know what’s fatal or not?”

“The next bill I get for my veterinary school loans I will be sure to pass along to you, Jacob.”

“You’re always throwing that degree in my face,” Jacob grumbles. “I get it, you went to college to get chewed on by weird amphibians --”

“Jacob, most amphibians don’t have teeth to chew with, they swallow their food whole.”

“...Wait,” Credence says slowly as they sit down at the table, laid out with so much food Credence thinks it’s bowing under its weight, “do they really not? Even those big komodo dragons we saw the other day?”

“Nope.” Newt is grinning as he plates Credence’s dinner before his own. He is careful that none of it touches on Credence’s plate. Credence loves him, very much. “Amphibians don’t have but a few nubs in the back of their mouths, sloths don’t even have enamel, aardvarks, armadillos, turtles…all toothless.”

“Alright, National Geographic. It’s my birthday and that means no science talk at the table, it gives me indigestion.”

Newt puts one of his warm, wide hands on Credence’s knee under the table and keeps it there while they eat. The chicken is good. He manages to eat almost the whole piece before he has to put his fork down, and he doesn’t feel overfull or bad at all as he waits for Newt and Jacob to finish their seconds and Queenie forces a cup of very sweet tea on him. Modesty likes some rosehip hibiscus blend she even puts under her eyes (?) in the mornings sometimes, and Tina has consistently tried to shove matcha down his throat for years, but Credence has never had much patience with the stuff. The Earl Grey Queenie gives him is drinkable with a lot of lemon in it, and it doesn’t taste like chewing flowers, which he is grateful for, at least. It also spares him from the coffee she and Newt take when they’re done with their plates. That is the real gift.

Once dinner is cleared away, Jacob carries a ceramic cake stand into the dining room, huffing and somehow sounding not at all displeased. “Can you believe I had to bake my own birthday cake?”

“Would you have really rather us made it?”

“I have faith Credence can do better than you simply by virtue of not being you, pal.”

“Modesty wouldn’t agree,” Credence smiles tentatively.

“Listen, I’ve witnessed this man commit unspeakable food crimes, whatever you’ve done can’t be that bad.”

“...Credence,” Newt mumbles sheepishly around a mouthful of cake, “Jacob is right.”

“Say that a little louder, won’t you?”

“I won’t say it again, I don’t care if it’s your birthday.”

Credence takes a small, cautious bite of the cake. It’s not too sweet, and though the cake is tender, the top is crunchy, layered with crisp, thinly sliced almonds and drizzled in sticky, spiced honey. Credence loves it.

“This is...so good.”

Jacob and Queenie’s chewing slows in unison. She beams at him after a moment, and the whole table seems to lighten up with her.

“Do you like it, sugar? Really?”

Credence takes another bite and Newt’s hand squeezes at his thigh. “I -- how did you make it?”

“I...could show you, if you want. It’s a _feel_ though. It’s not just a recipe.” Jacob studies him closely, fork in midair. “It’s a _process_. You get that?”

“I will...try?”

“I like you,” Jacob nods. “You’re alright.”

“I’m sure Credence is as warmed at your glowing commendation of his character as I am.” Newt pauses mid-chew. “I -- love, did we leave Jacob’s gift in the car? Let me go grab it.”

He’s up and out of his chair before any of them get another word in. Credence looks at his plate and listens to the scrape of metal utensils and china. Queenie speaks to him gently only after Credence finishes his last bite.

“...Are you happy, Credence?”

“Yes?”

Jacob takes a big gulp of his merlot. “What Queenie means is, we like you more than Newt.”

Queenie _tsk_ s. “Jacob, be nice. Credence doesn’t like you talking that way.”

“Uhm?”

“If you need anything,” she smiles easily, “just let us know. That’s all we mean. You two seem to make each other happy.”

“...Do you really think Tina will change her mind?”

Queenie is very slow putting her small hand on top of his. Giving him time to pull away, he recognizes that now. He doesn’t, and she’s grinning when he barely curls his hand around her slim, warm fingers.

“She loves you, Credence.”

He clears his throat.

“Can...can I really ask you for something? For a favor?”

II.

Newt has already dropped him off after work and Credence is already pulling his phone out to text Jacob when Modesty calls from the Y’s desk phone.

“Credence.”

“Sorry, who?”

“Credence,” she huffs. “Be serious, I know you remember how. I have a problem.”

“What’s wrong?” He asks sharply, his gut dropping to the floor. “Are you alright?”

“No, I’m being skinned alive as we speak. I only called to say goodbye. Listen, I have to stay late again but that means I’m gonna miss my bus.” She takes a deep breath. “And...Tina has a date tonight, so she can’t come.”

...A date?

“Let me call Newt. Is -- do you mind?”

“...Will you come with him?” She says finally. “Please.”

“Stay inside until we get there.”

Before he calls Newt, he texts Jacob. He has to rewrite it three times, but he feels decent about it when he hits send. Newt picks up on the second ring after he cradles the phone between his ear and shoulder, already shucking his coat back on.

“My love, I told you I would call when I got home. Unless you missed me too much to wait?”

For a minute, Credence forgets what he called for, filled only with the fluttery, warm feeling of hearing, impossibly, Newt smile through the phone.

“Uhm. Could you come back, please?”

“Are you alright? Is Modesty alright?”

“She needs a ride home from work.” Credence feels a flush bloom on his neck when he says it. Newt’s had a long day at work, and now he’s asking for favors. But Modesty would do it for him, and Newt tells him to ask for what he wants, and Credence mostly believes him, now. “I’m sorry, she had to stay late and Tina -- uhm, has a date, or something. So she can’t come…”

“Let me see if this light is green or not and I will turn around. I can’t tell from this far away.”

“ _Newt_.”

“I’m only joking, I’m joking. You haven’t told me about her new job, much. Does she like it?”

“Except when she has to stay late and clean the locker rooms, I guess. She says she likes having minions.”

Newt chuckles over the line, and it’s quiet as Credence settles himself outside his door, puffing misty white clouds into the thin, brittle air. The wall is freezing cold even through his coat as he slides down, drawing his knees up to his chest.

“Can...you stay on the phone?”

“You know I will.”

“Thank you,” he murmurs. “I...like this. I feel like you’re sitting with me.”

Maybe it’s his imagination he can hear the engine in Newt’s car through the line, but it doesn’t really matter if it’s real or not, to Credence.

“Do you want to talk?” Newt asks after a minute.

“Is it okay if we don’t?”

Modesty will chatter the whole way home, and so for now in the silent, cold dark, Credence likes that it’s just the two of them, even if they aren’t together. He might not ever feel brave enough to say it to Newt, but they feel close like this like how it was in Newt’s bathtub, like maybe they are the only two inhabitants of their own little, big, quiet world.

He listens to the sound of Newt’s softly clicking blinker, the revving and humming of his engine and A/C, with his lids heavy and his mind fuzzy.

“Darling?”

Credence jumps up so suddenly he nearly falls over.

“I’m out front, I see you dozing. Why are you waiting outside like that? You’ll get sick.”

He hangs the phone up as he stands, casting a baleful look to the headlights shining up underneath him, even though Newt won’t see it.

“That wasn’t nice,” Newt greets him when Credence finally steps into the blissful heat of his car.

“...The phone slipped.”

Newt is smiling when he cups Credence’s chin and turns his head to face him.

“I think you meeting Jacob was a bad idea. She works at the one on West Main, right?”

Credence nods, and he dares to keep Newt’s hand in his lap, playing with his fingers and tracing nonsense into his cupped palm as he exits their lot. Them, in their big, little world, quiet and close; just them under the passing yellow streetlights, the promise of snow heavy in the clouds swollen low.

“He wants you to come round again soon, by the way. He’s taken with you.”

“Jacob?”

“Mhm. He and Queenie were both enamored by your charm,” he smirks, squeezing at Credence’s hand.

“I don’t have any of that,” he mutters, grateful for the approaching light of the YMCA parking lot and the shine of his sister’s blonde, sweaty hair bounding towards them underneath. She yanks the back door open before they are even fully in park.

“Oh, my god. Thank you.”

“Hello, Modesty. Thank you for letting me,” Newt grins in the rearview. “Have you eaten dinner? Would you like me to stop somewhere?”

“I…” Modesty looks at him incredulously in the mirror before turning back to Newt, a tentative little smile on her face. “Not tonight, thank you.”

“If you’re sure.” Credence is pretty sure he is the only one who can tell that Newt is a bit crestfallen.

“So,” she leans forward, her chin resting on the back of Credence’s seat, “did you see any dragons today? Credence said you saw like two last week.”

“No dragons today, gladly. They all get grouchy when the weather is cold like this, they don’t like to be messed with and I don’t blame them. We had a few pygmy goats stop by though. Usually those are only house visits.”

She turns to Credence eagerly. “Did you pet them?”

“No. They have horns.”

“Little ones,” Newt offers innocently. “You should come by the office, if you want. I know Tara would love you.”

“...I do have my winter holidays starting soon.”

He beams at her in the mirror. “I’ll see when we have anything interesting coming in. Have you ever held a chinchilla? They’re quite soft, they like to be cuddled.”

Credence rests his head against the window and tunes most of their conversation out, happy to let them get to know each other and stay out of it lest he mess something up. He sticks his fingers in front of the vent closest to him, close enough his knuckles turn pink from the heat. It is very nearly Christmas, and Credence is very happy, even if he can’t be sure, precisely, when and where that started to happen.

Modesty thanks Newt twice when they park in their lot, and that is profuse, from her.

“I’ll -- I guess, uhm. See you upstairs?”

His face is on fire. “Yes, please,” he grinds out through his teeth. He takes it back. He’s too mortified to be happy.

“You know, I remember Theseus wearing that same expression. Some suffering is universal for older siblings.”

“Thank you for doing this, I know it’s late.”

Newt kisses his temple, the soft, sunken space above his eye.

“Anything you need.”

He bites the inside of his cheek before leaning forward to press their lips together. “You too.”

Credence waves at the headlights when he makes it up to his door, and he pulls back the curtain to watch them get swallowed up in the night once he’s inside.

“He’s nice.”

He looks over his shoulder. Modesty is rubbing a makeup wipe roughly over her face, wearing one of the new sweatshirts Newt bought him. For a brief, very ugly moment, he feels the snarl already on his tongue to tell her to take it off.

The heat in their building is dubious at best, and Newt would probably let her wear it, if he were here. Credence swallows the ugliness as best he can.

“He is nice.”

“I’m not sorry for giving you a hard time, before,” she insists, mascara still smudged under her eyes as she tears the wipe in her hands absently. “But I get it, now.”

He nudges her shoulder with his as he passes. That’s enough, for them.

“I still can’t believe you didn’t want to pet those dragons. _Lame_.”

*

Newt nuzzles underneath Credence’s jaw the next morning, half asleep, like they are home and not at his office. Tara has locked herself in the breakroom with the office’s coffee pot held hostage so Newt and the techs can’t touch it, though two of the techs are trying to negotiate its release through the closed door. In Tara’s absence, Drippy mews between their feet, desperate for attention neither of them give her. Newt’s hands stroke lazily at Credence’s sides, and his own arms rest circling Newt’s shoulders. It is altogether, perhaps, a million times better than any coffee could be, in his personal opinion.

“Are you in a good mood today?” Newt rasps, voice still scratchy from sleep. Credence had worked out he’d only had half a pot of his coffee at home, but Newt hadn’t told him why.

“What?”

He pulls back with a chaste kiss to Credence’s jaw, and Credence lets his arms fall loose from Newt’s neck. Newt’s eyelids are heavy, and he’s yawning more than speaking as he makes several failed attempts to grab his bag, resting in his chair.

“I have been looking for an excuse to give you one of your Christmas gifts early. If you’re in a good mood, I’d like to give it to you now.”

Drippy hops up on the desk and nudges at Credence’s hand insistently with her soft head. He is not brave enough yet to pet her without looking at where her mouth is in relation to his hand, but he thinks about it as he listens to Newt rustle around in his bag, scratching behind Drippy’s ears until he can’t stand it. Newt is holding it behind his back when Credence finally looks up.

Drippy gives a long, whining mewl before hopping off the desk and stalking out into the hall. Credence doesn’t know if it’s possible, but it seemed like she was pouting.

“Can I, then, love?”

Credence clasps his hands in front of him, then crosses them behind his back, unsure of how to accept it. Would reaching out seem greedy?

“I -- yes. Thank you.”

Newt smiles as he rests the small box on his desk before grabbing Credence’s hands, pulling them to his front and holding them there by his wrists.

“You don’t have to accept it now, if you don’t want it.”

Credence makes himself not look at the box. Maybe he should stretch this out, somehow. It feels different to the other things Newt has gotten him (and by now that list is long enough Credence feels a bit ashamed of it, when he stops to count). Newt is giving him a gift plainly as a gift, without trying to sneak it in or pass it off as something else. He trusts Credence to accept it.

“I want to, please.”

The box is in his hands for several seconds before he can look down at it.

“ _Newt_ \--”

“I believe you already said you would accept this.” He manages to hold off another yawn until after Credence starts sputtering, still staring down at his hands.

It’s _different_ to actually hold the phone, realizing the money Newt has spent on him; it’s a nicer model than what he and Modesty have at home, maybe he should have guessed that, but it also looks like it’s a newer one than Newt himself has.

All this, and just for Credence, because Newt wants to, and thinks it will make his life a little easier.

He puts it on the desk like he’s liable to break it if he looks at it too hard and wraps his arms around Newt’s waist.

“Thank you,” he murmurs into Newt’s shoulder. “Thank you.”

Newt kisses the crown of his hair. “We’ll set it up at lunch. Thank you for accepting it.”

There is a knock on the door. Credence is slow to disentangle himself, and if it makes him greedy or vain or spoiled, it doesn't matter, because he still spends the entire morning he thinks about the box waiting for him in the office.

*

Newt is sneaky, Credence forgot that.

In the box, when he opens it at lunch, two phones are sat, one on top of the other.

“I was hoping you would come with me and help pick out a case for Modesty,” he says tentatively. He hasn’t eaten any more of the peanut butter sandwich he’d brought than Credence has, which is odd. Credence would think it was odd, anyway, if he weren’t laser-focused on other things. One other thing.

“...Unless you think that is a bad idea?” Newt asks, when Credence doesn’t answer.

The phones in his lap are two anvils, and looking at them settles just as heavy in his chest and his thick throat.

Newt pushes himself out of his chair and crouches in front of Credence, frowning and pink cheeked. Credence wants to apologize, maybe, when Newt tilts his chin up. Newt is only being nice, Newt is Too Nice.

“Oh, Credence. I’m -- I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean...I didn’t want to upset you. I -- give them here, come here. I’m sorry.”

He buries his splotchy, wet face into Newt’s neck, and tries to pretend that doesn’t make it worse. Credence is lucky, at least, that he is a quiet crier; he and Modesty both, since there wasn’t an option not to be with That Woman. If Tara or the techs were to overhear he thinks he would actually, physically die. It’s bad enough Newt thinks he’s unappreciative after all he’s done and all the money he’s spent.

“Darling,” he murmurs after a moment of rubbing circles onto Credence’s back, “can you tell me what’s wrong?”

“I’m sorry --”

“I’m not upset with you, Credence. I just want to make sure I haven’t done anything that...that made you upset with me.”

He sucks in a deep breath. Newt thinks he did something wrong. Credence has to fix that.

“No. I -- just. I just,” he wiggles back from Newt, but he can’t look at Newt’s face. “I don’t know how to -- this is just a lot. I’m sorry.”

“I didn’t mean to overwhelm you, I should be the one apologizing. I should have mentioned getting one for Modesty. I just thought it would be more convenient, if she is working now and needs anything, that way she’s not without if there’s an em--”

Credence’s chest has maybe never felt so warm and so big and full when he brings Newt’s hands up to kiss them. His face is still wet and gross and it probably doesn’t feel nice, but Newt lets him. Newt always does.

“Thank you.”

It feels too small for what he actually feels, so inadequate it might even be a lie, but Newt beams at him and starts tearing into the box.

“I already put my number in here this morning, let me show you. Actually, let’s take a picture together, our screens can match --”

*

After work, they pick out cases and protective screens and all sorts of things Credence didn’t know phones needed. His is a shiny black with a small, white smiley face on the back, which Newt seems to like in a way that goes over Credence’s head. The one he picks out for Modesty is a gradient of different, bright glitters underneath a black print like mermaid scales. They even get conned into a fluffy, pink charm like a bunny’s tail by the sales associate, which Credence thinks Modesty will understand and appreciate more than he could.

(At the checkout, Newt slyly slides a matching white one up to the counter and looks determinedly away from the flat stare Credence sends his way. Still, he allows Newt to clip it on his phone when they are back in the car, unable to keep himself from fidgeting with it once it’s there. It’s soft, he can’t believe he likes it.)

“Can we save Modesty’s for Christmas, please?”

“If you'd like.”

Credence takes a deep breath, looking up at his apartment complex like he’s in front of a stranger’s home.

“Uhm. I ask because I….I want -- I want to have you over. For dinner. With, uhm, the three of us. If you want. Like, a Christmas...thing. Before we go to your house. The two of us go to your house,” he feels the need to clarify.

Newt squeezes his hand over the gearshift.

“Tell me when, I’ll be there.”

He waits until Modesty is asleep in the bedroom before he curls up on the end of the futon and opens Safari on his new phone, and even so it feels like he’s being judged as he types into google.

But Newt had said this was his Christmas gift, too, and it’s only fair that Credence does his part.

III.

“I don’t want a ride home today.”

Newt looks up from the massive, yellowing encyclopedia on his desk. The pen he was chewing on clatters on top of his scrawled notes.

“What?”

“I --” Credence bites his lip. Should he have said that differently? “I don’t, uhm, want one. If that’s...okay.”

“Oh -- of, of course. Of course. Is...everything alright?” He asks very carefully, looking back to the book. The next morning he had some sort of heart valve surgery for a rottweiler that was made complicated by something Credence didn’t understand, and he’d been glued to every textbook and encyclopedia in his office for the past two days in preparation for it. Credence had used his phone to look up what mitral valve disease was, when Tara was in the restroom and Newt was on a house call, but it didn’t help clear things up any. He probably couldn’t have helped Newt even if he was smart enough to understand.

His stomach twists suddenly. Maybe he shouldn’t have brought it up -- he’s distracting Newt when he’s clearly trying to do something difficult. If he couldn’t help, the least he could do was not actively make it worse. But he’s never been too good at that.

“Y-yeah. I just, uhm. Uhm.” _Oh, god_. Could he fuck this up worse? “I just need -- or, I mean, I don’t --”

Newt caps his pen, and even though he speaks to Credence evenly he is looking down at the desk.

“I...Credence, if I do anything that bothers you, I want you to tell me. To be honest. I won’t ever be mad for you telling me things you like or don’t.”

He frowns. “What?”

Newt leans back in his chair and rubs a hand over his face before speaking. Each word is slow, like he is forcing it out against his better judgement.

“I just -- this was a lot, for Tina, but she never _told_ me, so I didn’t know to...back off. And I, Credence, I can’t tell you how much I don’t want that to happen with you. I couldn’t -- I can’t stand the thought. So just be honest with me, please. You won’t hurt my feelings.”

Credence whimpers. _Oh, god_. He would have to apologize to Newt, later, and hope Newt forgave him.

“...I’m not Tina.” He pauses. “I’m not Tina in...any way.”

Except, apparently, the lying part.

Newt sighs. “Will you call me when you get home, at least?”

“Yes, sir.”

“...Can I drive you to the bus stop?”

“...If you want.”

*

Modesty is working, and Credence is glad. He changes clothes when he gets home, his new favorite pair of jeans and the sweater and scarf Newt like on him best, so he can maybe imagine Newt is with him. He still has one of Newt’s coats, and he puts it on even though he’s still inside and breathes in the smell at the collar.

Okay. He can do this.

He is more nervous than is probably warranted downloading Lyft onto his phone and painstakingly checking over the card information -- he never uses it, really, and it feels like theft even though it is his money. Modesty set up their bills with it when they first opened the new bank account for automatic withdrawal, and every Friday Credence deposited most of his check in there to cover them, only keeping out enough cash for Modesty to go grocery shopping, by and large.

But he won’t risk the bus in case he runs into Modesty, and even so doesn’t think he could take all the bags with him, even if he was inclined to risk it.

Still, he is nervous entering in the car, and his driver huffs whenever Credence fumbles his attempts at small talk before dropping him off at the mall, clearly grateful to see the back of him. Credence gives him a tip he assumes is generous to try and make up for it before making a beeline for the ATM machine in the food court. Modesty checks the bank statements sometimes, and Credence wants to do this right.

Credence keeps his hands in his pockets around his phone and wallet as he walks around the noise and crowds, the back of his neck splotchy and hot. He has never carried so much money on his person in his entire life, he is sure he is going to lose or waste it somehow.

He bumps into someone's shoulder as they pass, and he forces himself to think of something else lest he mow someone down next time. Modesty would be upset with him, maybe; they always did their shopping together, but there was no chance on this entire green earth that she was going to come with him for this particular experience. This is also the first time he has the ability to get her something not from Target’s clearance section or the Dollar General, so she will also probably forgive him.

“Ma’am?”

The woman at the counter only comes up to his shoulder, even in her tall, shiny heels. She smells like something expensive, and her shiny lipstick reflects as much light as her carefully plaited hair when she smiles at him expectantly.

He doesn’t know what he is asking for, even a guess, so he just settles on, “help, please.”

Her grin is impossibly wide as she puts her small, immaculately manicured hand in the crook of his elbow. “How old is she?”

The sales associate is named Janecia, and when Credence leaves an hour and a half later, laden with bags, he is very tempted to buy her a gift, too. He settles on a tip that makes her do a little double take before shoving more samples in his bags and adding another little gift with purchase “for himself.”

Credence will give it to Newt.

He has to shuffle his bags awkwardly to buy a thin, limp slice of pizza in the food court, but only manages to down half of it waiting for his next Lyft. He looks around like he’s expecting to be scolded by a passerby as he opens the tabs in his phone’s browser from earlier, double checking what he needs, and he still can’t believe himself when the Lyft drops him off.

*

The surgery goes fine, apparently, until it doesn’t.

Credence can only try to stay out of everyone’s way the rest of the day. Newt skips lunch and takes a very long housecall to tend to some sheep with Bluetongue Disease on the other side of town, (Credence googles it when he is gone, because he can now, instead of bothering Newt or Tara and feeling dumb. It is, unfortunately, named literally), and Tara is particularly short with the techs, whose blubbering and moping even bother Credence, who barely notices them most days.

“There are customers,” Tara hisses across the desk, filled with quiet venom. “Get your _shit_ together.”

“I’m sorry,” one of them sniffs. Credence glares up at them. Drippy and Margaret Catwood are both sitting in his lap, heavy with sleep, and he doesn’t feel any better for it. He determines it is this tech’s fault the rottweiler’s owner had to be escorted out by Newt, stoic and silent and looking anywhere but their wet, red face.

“Don’t be sorry,” he snaps.

Tara turns so quickly in her chair the wheels squeak, and Margaret Catwood shoots off his lap like a bottle rocket, her little claws digging into his thigh. The tech is staring at them, their face slack like they’ve seen a ghost.

“...Excuse me? I didn’t know you could talk to anyone but Newt.”

There is a fire in his belly that feels familiar and nearly welcome, that other Thing that sometimes wore Credence’s body as its own sniffing the air with interest. Credence speaks very slowly and looks directly at the tech when he answers, his chin jutted out.

“I said don’t be sorry. Just don’t mess up again.”

Tara exhales loudly beside him before turning back to the open mouthed tech.

“I said you need to leave. Wipe your face, get back to work.”

The tech storms off, and if Tara stares at him oddly, she doesn’t say anything.

*

“Can you give me a few minutes?” Newt mutters in his ear as Tara and the techs leave for the night, and it’s just the two of them and the soft buzzing of the fluorescent lights overhead.

“Do you want to be alone?”

Newt wraps his arms around Credence’s waist from behind, his chin resting on Credence’s shoulder. Credence wants to lean into it, but it feels like Newt is resting on him more than anything, so he is careful to stand as still as possible.

“No, I do not.”

“It’s not your fault.”

“I’m the surgeon,” he says gruffly. “Of course it is my fault.”

“Well I don’t think so,” Credence says stiffly. Newt takes a big breath before kissing at the side of Credence’s neck.

“No. You think it was that tech’s fault, don’t you?”

Credence stiffens underneath him, but Newt doesn’t let him pull away. “Tara was surprised to hear you talk that way, but I think she was a little proud of you, too.”

He licks at his lips, unsure of what he is really asking. “Were you?”

“What made you decide it was their fault, Credence?”

Margaret Catwood hops onto the counter next to them, batting the cup of pens to the floor and chasing them around on the tile.

“...Because I didn’t want it to be mine,” he chokes out finally.

Newt turns him around, frowning. All the lines on his face are in relief; Credence doesn't recognize it's Newt at all the first few blinks he's looking down at him.

“What on earth are you talking about?”

“I upset you yesterday, and --”

Newt takes his face in both hands, and Credence doesn’t look at him even when Newt asks him to.

“Credence, nothing that happened today is your fault.”

“I feel like it is,” he says miserably, leaning forward to rest his forehead on Newt’s shoulder.

“Everyone feels like that when we lose one,” Newt says finally. He rucks up the hem of Credence’s scrub to trace warm patterns on his lower back. “And like I told you, I will never be upset with you being honest with me.”

“It’s not your fault,” Credence insists again, because it is the only honest thing he can think of. “It’s not. You always do your best, and I think your best is always good.”

“It wasn’t enough.”

“Then no one could have done it.”

Newt kisses his cheek as he pulls away, but it feels like he is just humoring Credence. “I appreciate that.”

Credence glowers at his back as he collects the rest of his things from the office, unsure what exactly he is feeling and who it’s directed at.

“Take me home with you.”

“...Credence.”

He clinks their teeth together before the kiss lands right, and Newt lets him have his way for a moment before he pulls back. Credence feels him ready to refuse, making up some excuse. He won’t hear it.

“ _Please_ , Newt. I want to.”

Newt is very quiet in the car, and for the first time as they crest the stairs into Newt’s house, it is awkward. Newt's home has always erred on Spartan, but never barren like how it feels with Newt standing beside him like he's been bleached of all color and feeling.

“You should shower.”

He looks at Credence with both of his eyebrows raised up to his hairline. Credence only grimaces. It feels like he is doing this all wrong, but he is unsure how else to go about it -- Credence is acting like how he likes Newt to be, but maybe that’s the problem?

“I...want, uhm. You said I could ask for stuff I want, right?”

“Right,” Newt says, utterly bemused. “Are you going to join me?”

“No. I’m...I’m going to make you dinner.”

“I don’t know if I have anything for you to make, even if you wanted to.”

“I do want to,” he insists. “Please -- please let me try.”

Credence is very sure, for a very long minute, that Newt is going to turn him down. But he eventually does walk to his bedroom wordlessly, and Credence waits until the shower sputters to life before he allows himself to start poking around in the kitchen.

Newt was not exaggerating, his fridge and cabinets are largely bare. But Credence has been making Modesty grilled cheese sandwiches since he was old enough to reach the gas knobs on their old stove at That Woman’s, and he manages, even if he suspects the bread Newt has is a little stale. After, he wipes the counters off and loads the dishwasher with mostly the little plastic cutlery from their takeout as he listens to Newt fumbling around in his bedroom.

“Do you know,” Newt murmurs moment later, his wet hair dripping on Credence’s neck and shoulder as he suctions himself to Credence’s back, “I have never successfully made a grilled cheese.”

Credence hands over the beer he’d opened for him, and is very careful when he answers. “I don’t know how that’s possible.”

Newt takes a very, very long swig from the bottle.

“I don’t like to dwell on it. Oh! You’ve cut it in triangles. Even Jacob wouldn’t do that for me.”

Newt looks like he is feeling a little better, at least more alive, and it is only part of the reason warm pleasure starts to curl in his belly.

“Will you sit and eat it, please?”

He carries the plate into the living room and settles on the floor in front of the couch as Newt all but collapses into his favorite spot. Credence rests his head against Newt’s knee and listens to him chew underneath the sound of the news on the television, wondering what, exactly, he is going to do next.

Newt scratches at his scalp after he finishes, and Credence purrs a bit under the attention, the relaxing drag of Newt’s blunt nails raking up the back of his neck and the buzz there, his thick fingers tangling in his hair.

“That was delicious, Credence. Thank you.”

Credence allows him to make that very generous overstatement, and stands to turn the TV off when Newt pulls his hand away from his head.

“Can I choose what we do next?”

“...If you'd like,” Newt nods, his smile faint but _there_ as he allows Credence to guide him by the hand to his own bedroom. Credence is absolutely sure he is doing something wrong, or at least probably about to, but Newt lets him try, and that’s enough for Credence to peel his scrubs off, tossing them into the hamper next to the bathroom door.

Credence has his own drawer in Newt’s dresser, now, and a toothbrush in the cup on his sink. Newt sits on the edge of his bed and silently watches Credence brush his teeth and slip on his soft flannel pajama bottoms as Credence second-guesses how effective this whole plan or experiment was to actually making Newt feel better, instead of put upon to play along for Credence's sake. He flicks off the bathroom light as he walks back into the bedroom's plush carpet, thinking only that his time was up.

“What now, boss?”

“Are you making fun of me?”

Newt grabs Credence’s hips and pulls him forward between the bracket of his own spread knees.

“I would never.”

Credence looks down his nose at him, and Newt relents with a little smile on his face.

“I do feel better, darling. Thank you, truly. I’m glad you wanted to come home with me, I would have stayed up all night moping otherwise.”

Credence pets at the fuzzy curls mostly dry on Newt’s head.

“You need to go grocery shopping. Modesty can help you.”

Newt groans, tugging him into bed. He wiggles one of his knees between Credence’s, and his arms are warm and heavy holding him close enough to his chest Newt can nuzzle at his hair. Credence is dozing but not quite when Newt speaks, his own voice thick with sleep.

“You never said what you wanted to do.”

Credence shrugs as much as he’s able under Newt’s weight.

“Just this.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content warnings: nongraphic mention of a dog's death.
> 
> Thank you so much for being patient with me as I got this chapter out :') In the time since the last update, I quit my day job and finished my own novel, and between those two things and some personal business, I haven't had the time or headspace to give this particular fic the attention it needs.
> 
> Being said, when I did sit down to write this last chapter, it got super long. Like...super long. I was originally going to post it all at once as a final hurrah...but it was so. long. Too long just for one go. So I have, once again, added another unplanned chapter to this fic lmfao. This last part will be posted if not in the next day or so, at least sometime this week. 
> 
> I can't tell you how much all the feedback and kudos have meant to me so far, but especially as I wrapped this fic up. I've never had the response to any of my other writing as I have this fic, and it means more than the world to me. If you've stuck with me this far, the last chapter is especially for you ;)
> 
> Thanks for reading! Feedback is always loved and occasionally tattooed on my physical person <3 You can also come talk to me on tumblr, I'm [here](http://violetteacup.tumblr.com).


	8. Part Eight

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> See end notes for content warnings.

I.

Credence is going to die.

“ _Please_ get them out of the oven, Modesty, I have to wrap this, oh my god -- I’m, I think I’m dying.”

“Calm down.”

“You are not _helping_.”

“Merry Christmas to you, too,” she grumbles, pushing past him and into the overwarm kitchen as Credence struggles like Drippy or Margaret Catwood with especially stubborn pieces of Scotch tape, sprawled on his bedroom floor.

The doorbell rings as he’s scribbling directly onto the wrapping paper with a sharpie. Even though it is his absolute best, most careful handwriting it looks terrible.

“Anyone home?”

Credence slams the door shut to his bedroom even though everything is now wrapped and jogs out into the living room. It’s hardly a few feet but it feels like a mile in his tight, dry lungs.

Newt pokes his head around the front door, grinning. In one hand is the key Modesty had handed him solemnly after he picked her up from work again last week. Snow dusts his hair, and the flakes that aren’t sitting fat and white in his tousled curls are melted to shine in the light like little gems around his rosy cheeks.

Credence is going to _die_.

Newt is freezing and a little wet from the snow when Credence gets his arms around him, and the smell of his cold, pink skin underneath his cologne makes Credence’s toes curl.

“Merry Christmas.”

“Happy Christmas to you, sweet thing.” He kisses Credence only briefly before setting the heavy looking bags in his hand down with the other presents stacked in the living room. Credence and Modesty have a plastic tabletop tree, no more than a foot tall and bald in places, on their small bookshelf that is mostly full now with Newt’s previous gifts. The ones Newt places underneath it now outnumber the ones Credence and Modesty originally had there by a ratio that makes Credence uncomfortable, when he really thinks about it.

But he is not going to ruin anything tonight if he can help it.

Modesty is wiping her hands on her white jeans when she steps out of the kitchen, her hair carefully curled and her cheeks made up with a shimmery blush that catches the little flashing LED lights from their tree when she leans forward to hug Newt.

“I’m so glad you’re here, he was driving me crazy.”

Newt kisses her cheek as she pulls back, smiling. “Is it over what smells so good in there?”

Credence feels his chest puff out a bit even though he tries to keep himself calm. “Yes,” he admits evenly, since it is true, and also as it doesn’t matter, because, “I made it.”

“You -- did you really?”

The doorbell rings.

What? What? What?

“Uhm?”

“Oh. That’ll be Tina.”

For a very brief moment, Credence can only gape at Modesty’s back as she answers the door and Tina walks in, holding hands with an objectively beautiful woman with a very tight, shiny ponytail.

“Seraphina!” Newt smiles beside him, suddenly enough Credence jumps a bit. Seraphina returns his smile, her arms open as he steps forward. “I’m so glad to see you again. How are you?”

“I’m well. You look good, Newt, I’m glad.”

Modesty is grinning at him smugly when Newt hugs Seraphina before kissing Tina’s cheek. All of them are smiling; Tina is even pink-cheeked and -- and maybe, Credence realizes, a bit drunk -- and if he didn’t know better he’d think that was a lipstick stain on the collar of her pink shirt.

“Oh...my god?”

“You must be Credence, then?”

He stumbles forward only when Newt gives him a very small nod. She extends her hand easily, and Credence watches Tina look between them both closely. Not that drunk, then, maybe.

“Seraphina Picquery. I work with Tina --”

“She also dates Tina,” Tina interrupts her drily.

“Please like lasagna,” Credence says dumbly as he shakes her hand, the only coherent thought in his brain. “I don’t know how to make anything else.”

Seraphina thinks he is making a joke, and Tina and Modesty laugh along with her as they walk into the kitchen.

“When did these lasagna skills come to be?” Newt murmurs in Credence’s ear as Tina and Modesty fall in their usual routine of setting out the cups and flatware.

“I asked Jacob for a favor. A lot of favors. I was not very good at first.” Credence’s ears are on fire as he double checks the women are all busy and giggling amongst themselves -- Seraphina played lacrosse in college, and Modesty nearly swoons when she mentions it -- before he turns to Newt fully, speaking more softly than before.  
“I wanted to do something nice for you. Something good, I mean.”

Newt isn’t smiling, exactly, when he kisses the corner of Credence’s mouth, but Modesty is clearing her throat pointedly behind them before he can fully submerge into panic like he desperately, desperately wants to.

Newt is friends with Tina and Seraphina, and Credence won’t embarrass him in front of them. He sits down and cuts pieces out of the casserole dish Jacob loaned him for Newt and Modesty, though he fumbles the spatula handing it to Tina, still hardly believing she is here. Credence watches Seraphina look briefly at his own empty plate, but she doesn’t say anything.

Newt only mentions it when the scraping of forks and Seraphina and Modesty’s chatter can hide his murmur.

“Are you alright?”

“Yes.”

He nudges Credence’s knee under the table, and he doesn’t seem convinced. Credence looks around the table before grabbing a piece of the garlic bread and taking a small, pointed bite of it. He smiles to hide his chewing, and Newt is appeased enough to go back to his own plate and let Credence put the rest of the bread down. He doesn’t touch it again.

“This is better than how Jacob makes it.”

“That is not true.”

“Credence made us eat it like every night for a week while he practiced, so it better be.”

“It’s good.” Tina’s smile is tentative like it was when she was meeting them both for the first time, newly assigned to their case. “Queenie said you were working hard on it, and Jacob too. He doesn’t give praise easy.”

“Thank you,” Credence says, just as careful. Across from him, Modesty beams, all teeth, and that’s enough for Credence to feel good about it. Newt wants him to play nice, and so does Modesty, and he loves them enough to try. And it is Christmas, after all. Tina is trying -- for the same reasons, he is sure -- and Credence can, too.

“Was I the only one in the dark about this?”

“Don’t pout, Newt,” Seraphina grins. “He wanted to do something nice for you. Appreciate it for how delicious it is.” She winks at Credence, and he watches Tina grab her hand where it rests between their drinks.

This is, somehow, not going badly.

It is hard to convince Modesty and Tina to leave the dishes after everyone’s eaten, but together he and Newt manage, once Seraphina joins in. She even helps him after he grabs the gifts from his bedroom, when they threaten to topple over in his arms now that he has to bring Tina’s out, too. Credence thinks she is alright, all things considered, and so he doesn’t really mind when she sits down next to him on their futon, Newt on his other side.

Newt divvies his gifts up at Modesty and Credence’s feet, and Credence sees Modesty slyly pull a box out behind the bookcase and hand it to Tina. Slowly, Credence reaches into his own pile and hands her one, too. He has half a mind to give her Queenie and Jacob’s as well, but something holds him back. He should do that himself, after everything.

“You both didn’t have to do this,” Tina tells them, but she’s looking in her lap and smiling. Modesty gets her a set of bubble baths and lotion that smell like the the mint tea candle she used to keep in her office, and Tina and Seraphina both coo over them before Tina opens Credence’s box. She is very quiet at first, and Credence digs his fingers into Newt’s knee beside him hard enough he is surprised he doesn’t break the skin there like a blister.

“Did you pick this out yourself, Credence?” She asks finally, holding the little bracelet and earrings in her hands very carefully. He clears his throat. Did he get the wrong ones? He tried for the kind she usually wore, but maybe he didn’t remember right.

“I had some help. Janecia said gold and silver didn’t match, when I tried to check out at first.”

Tina is sat on the floor next to Modesty, but she rises up on her knees to grab his hand not anchored to Newt’s leg, grinning and pink.

“I love them. My old hoops bent, so I haven’t been able to wear them. Thank you.”

Credence has to convince himself to flip his hand over to squeeze at hers, but he does it.

Newt kisses his temple as Tina sits back down and Modesty starts tearing into her gifts. Tina gets Modesty a new pair of cleats and several sweaters, and she gets Credence a mug that has gold letters on it proclaiming “One Mug to Rule them All,” with a tin of Earl Grey and a massive, soft scarf that Newt wraps around his neck and face while he and Seraphina giggle at how it covers nearly everything but Credence’s eyes. Credence keeps it there, because it’s not bothering him _really_ , as he opens Modesty’s gift; a trilogy of books called _Mistborn_ and some red pajamas that are lined with thick, soft fleece that he can’t stop rubbing between his fingers once he’s got them in his lap.

When she opens his gifts, her mouth falls slack and open and she is silent for longer than he has heard her be in a very, very long time. Credence, himself, is unsure what’s in any three of the boxes, really. Perfume, that’s in one, with little bottles of matching lotion and bubble bath, makeup of all sorts in another, all bright colors and little sparkly tubes, and the final is one that has face wash and a mask and lotions and something called a toner which Janecia insisted was “essential and life-changing.”

“I need to meet this Janecia woman,” she says finally, climbing up to her feet to wrap her arms around his neck. “I love you, Credence.”

He hugs her back, the knot in his stomach loosening. She likes it, he did good. Janecia did good, anyway. Credence just helped, a little. That makeup box, at least, he chose based on if he thought Modesty was “cool-toned” or “warm-toned.” Of course, he had no idea what it meant for a human being to be “warm” or “cool,” but one box had a lot of purple in it, which he knows Modesty likes.

He might have even been right.

“Does this mean you know what toner is?”

“I can’t wait for you and Newt to leave so I can use all these by myself,” she whispers conspiratorially in his ear before she pulls back.

“Can -- can we wait for our presents until we get to your house, please?” Credence asks Newt softly as Modesty sits back down, Seraphina and Tina both examining the boxes. Seraphina looks impressed, at least, which Credence likes.

“...If you’d like.” There is a little crease between Newt’s brow, but it smooths out when he turns to Modesty. “Credence helped me pick out part of yours, so if you don’t like it, it’s partially his fault.”

Modesty looks down at the boxes in front of her pointedly. “And which one is that, exactly?”

She grabs the first box next to her without waiting for an answer -- it’s the pink charm, all nested alone in tissue paper in the middle of a box far too large for it.

Newt is, perhaps, a bit of a shit.

“This is very nice,” Modesty says carefully. “Thank you.”

“The box to your left,” Credence grunts, running a hand over his face. He won’t deny there is anxious anticipation hot in his belly, even though it is Newt’s gift, really.

Modesty stills when the phone is in her hand.

“There is...no fucking way.”

Seraphina snorts beside him, and Tina is looking between Modesty and Newt with an expression on her face Credence can’t place exactly; incredulous, maybe, but also resigned.

“I hope since you’re working and out more, now, this makes it easier --”

Modesty hugs him, and Credence is smiling wider than is probably called for when Newt wraps his arms around her, grinning.

“Thank you for accepting it.”

Modesty coos over the case Credence picked out, flashing it this way and that in the light, and Credence’s chest feels like it’s creaking open in half watching her. She looks young, and if Credence knows she’s been happy since leaving That Woman, this is the first time he’s seen her so light. She is looking around their full living room with her smile so wide his own face hurts, and her hands barely tremble reaching into the next box.

He rests his head on Newt’s shoulder.

“Thank you.”

Newt kisses the back of his hand as Modesty rips into the second to last box of hers, pulling out a Kindle. Credence does a double take, himself.

“I have no clue about any science fiction books you may like, but this way maybe you can pick your own.”

“This is so much,” Modesty says softly. “I don’t --”

She looks up at the futon, her knuckles white on the Kindle’s box. “Are you sure?”

“If you don’t like it, we can take it back,” Newt shifts awkwardly. Credence squeezes his hand. Modesty is still looking at the box like it might go away if she blinks too long. Credence remembers what it was like, getting gifts like this at first; Modesty hadn’t even been broken in slowly with little things before Newt dropped this on her.

She is sniffling when she opens the next box, the smallest of all of them with a few gift cards stacked together with a pretty silver necklace wrapped around them, a little half moon pendant dangling off and throwing light across the room. Her eyes are red and shining but she doesn’t cry, and soon after Seraphina and Tina find a reason to make a graceful exit.

“We’ll let you get settled with all your goodies.” Tina’s smile is small, but Modesty doesn’t seem to mind, still looking over all the gifts around her with her mouth slightly open.

“It was good to see you, Newt.” Seraphina hugs him by the door with one arm, her other hand holding a grocery bag full of leftovers. “If you ever feel like expanding your sugar daddy ventures, I wear an eight and a half shoe and my favorite color is blue.”

She is cackling guiding Tina out of the door while they all sputter and flush different shades of mortification. Credence walks back to his bedroom as soon as the front door is shut to avoid dealing with it, grabbing the bag he’d packed earlier and ignoring whatever Newt and Modesty start talking about softly when he leaves.

They are knelt on the floor together when he returns to the living room, looking over the Kindle. She looks up when Credence sets his bag down, and her eyelashes are just a little wet.

“Are you sure you don’t mind me going?” He asks her lowly.

“I hope you do, so I can mess around with all these and have the house to myself. You always complain about the candles I put on when I have a bubble bath, anyway.”

But she is smiling, and he hugs her, smiling, too.

“Because they smell like wet dog,” he says as he pulls away, because he can’t not, knowing how it bothers her, and shoulders his bag before scooping the gifts in his arms. As they leave, Modesty hugs Newt tight enough Credence hears him grunt underneath her skinny arms. He’s even walking a little stiffly on their way to the car, but Credence is all but vibrating in his skin, nearly seeing double, and he can hardly focus on anything outside of himself as he wedges his bag between his knees in the passenger’s seat, and tries to be patient.

II.

“Is that what you are?”

Credence isn’t patient. They are three turns from Newt’s place and he can’t keep himself from asking.

“I’m what?”

“A...a sugar daddy.” It is hard to get the words out; they feel like something dirty. Credence has no other ruler for how relationships should be or are, and if he suspects there is something special or different about theirs, Credence has chalked it up to Newt, who is special and Good and a million other things that Credence couldn’t imagine anyone else ever coming close to being. But he’s never thought of that specialness as dirty or illicit like how those words feel, somehow.

Newt doesn’t answer him immediately, and when Credence turns to look at him, he is redfaced and not smiling. He feels his own cheeks start to heat. Maybe he was wrong, then.

“Are you? Is that -- bad?”

He puts the car in park. They decorated Newt’s Christmas tree last week, and from the bay window in the living room the it is the only light coming from his house.

They had laid underneath it, after. The little lights had made Credence dizzy after a while, but he couldn’t look away. They had made everything seem impossibly warmer and softer than it already was, with Newt’s head on his chest so Credence could toy absently with his riotous hair.

It didn’t feel bad.

“I told you I liked taking care of you,” Newt says finally, as they are cresting the steps to his house. “You don’t have to call it anything you don’t want to.”

Credence’s arms are noodles when he drops the gifts and his bag on the couch. He tries to think of how to say it very carefully.

“What do you want to call it?”

Newt sighs, shucking his coat off, then Credence’s, before drawing him close by his hips. It’s more of a sigh Newt presses to his mouth than a kiss, but there’s something about it that has his eyes rolling back in his head even before Newt sucks his top lip into his mouth.

“I call it I love you, Credence.”

“You what?”

Newt pulls back, and the Christmas lights from the tree are tiny stars in Newt’s eyes, little red sparks in Newt’s hair, a thousand hot sparks settling in Credence’s heart.

“I love you.”

Credence cups his hands around Newt’s cheeks, kisses him careful like how he wanted to do it that first time in the kitchen, maybe a million years ago for all it feels like. Careful because he trusts his body, fallible and awkward as it is, more than he trusts his ability to speak a truth so big words wouldn’t possibly stretch to fit it, even three of the biggest ones he knows.

And Newt is kissing him back just as careful, just as thorough, all slow glides of tongue and the barest threat of teeth, the drag of their hips together, their hands slow and purposeful and somehow everywhere all the same.

He pushes Newt back until he stumbles onto the couch, over one of the gifts. Credence is ungrateful and a million other things, but there is no way in any world he and Newt are together that any single one of those gifts is better than grinding onto Newt’s lap, Newt’s hands a blissful, calloused drag underneath his sweater, Newt, loving him, impossibly, Newt’s mouth panting up into his own, barely forming Credence’s name over and over for Credence to chase with his own.

Credence is sure he is blue in the face when he pulls back, gasping like he’s been held underwater. Newt is glassy eyed underneath him, panting and mussed, and Credence feels brave. He prepared for this, after all.

“I brought stuff.”

Newt cocks an eyebrow. “You what?”

“Stuff. The stuff --” Credence fumbles the grip on his bag as he drags it up to the couch beside them. “I googled it,” he clarifies when Newt continues looking at him like he isn’t speaking English.

Slowly, Newt cranes his neck to look into the bag. Credence studies his face as it goes slack before Newt reaches in to pull out several of the bottles of lube (apparently they were all different, and he wanted Newt to have something he liked), foil packets similarly in all different kinds (?), colors (??), and flavors (???).

Credence grabs his wrist when he reaches in again and nudges the empty box in the bag, too embarrassed for Newt to see it. Newt just looks at him like he’s never quite seen him before, speaking very quietly.

“...What’s this?”

“I told you, I googled --” Credence cuts himself off, unable to look up from Newt’s navel and unbearably hot around the ears. “I didn’t want to leave the box for -- for Modesty to see.”

“Will you stand up for me, please?”

Maybe he has done this wrong. Credence is slow rising to his feet, wary even as Newt stands, grabbing the bag in one hand and Credence’s wrist in the other. He follows Newt to the bedroom, feels the thud of Newt dropping the bag in his watery feeling knees.

“All the ways I imagined this,” Newt murmurs into the skin of his neck, his hands busy peeling Credence’s sweater off, “somehow this still wasn’t one of them. I should have known.”

Credence fumbles the zip on Newt’s jeans but only just gets them undone when Newt walks him back to the bed.

“Lie back, let me look at you.”

His whole body is receptive to Newt, and what Newt wants, and not at all to his own brain, which has been replaced by useless, heavy feeling TV static. Newt is slow peeling his pants and underwear off, his gaze assessing and careful and proprietary now that he’s taken off the armor he himself bought.

Slowly, he climbs on the bed and on top of Credence. His hands splay out and dip in the mattress on either side of his head, but Credence hardly has a chance to lean up and press their lips together when the dragging grind of denim at his aching groin have him bucking up blindly with a cry.

“Tell me what you want.”

Credence’s face is on fire. Newt sucks a bruise on the silky skin behind his ear before biting at the lobe. “I want to hear it.”

“I -- I want. I want you to...to! F- _fuck_ ,” he hisses when Newt’s mouth is hot around his nipple, trailing filthy kisses on his collarbone, the hollow of his throat. “In me, please -- Newt, I want, I want, I want.”

Newt’s shirt is off and his trousers and briefs follow immediately after, hurried in a way Credence would have preferred to be slower, maybe, if he were in his right mind. It is very cold when Newt rises off of him to dig in the bag, weighing two bottles in his hands.

“Preference?”

“Whatever gets you back in bed faster,” he whines.

“Cherry it is then,” Newt mutters. “Bend your knees for me -- very good, hips up. Perfect, my love, so good for me.”

He is crouched at the foot of the bed, and Credence is very close to pouting since the angle doesn’t allow him to watch, or even see Newt, but Newt is sucking rosy bruises low on Credence’s belly as he shoves a pillow underneath his hips and it is alright, maybe, in the big picture.

Newt takes the head of him in his mouth, just briefly, just a tease. Credence whines when the velvet heat of him is gone, then hears the _schlicking_ noise of Newt’s rough hands rubbing together before there is a warm, slick hand trailing back to his entrance. Newt is slow, just brushing around the furl of muscle while his other hand starts to make gentle strokes at Credence’s length.

“So sweet for me, yes, relax, just like that,” he murmurs, the words low and soft and running together, incomprehensible as water babbling over rocks, “let me take care of you, oh, Credence, you’re so good for me.”

It is hard not to clench down as soon as Newt gets in him, even just a little, but Newt is patient and oddly relaxed above him, stroking him almost lazily until he moves to spread Credence’s knees wider to fit between. He keeps his hand working to loosen Credence up as he leans over to murmur in his ear.

“I think about you just like this, darling, coming apart for me. Just for me.” Credence feels so full already, there’s sweat peppering his brow and his breath is shallow trapped underneath Newt’s weight, the air in the bedroom smelling like artificial sugar and Newt, who talks him through everything, “Let me take care of you, perfect, sweetheart, like that. I knew you’d take me so good, I think you’ll beg for it. You will now.”

There is, impossibly, another digit, but they crook and hit a place that has Credence screaming and near cross eyed.

“Yes,” Newt grins into his jaw. “Something like that.”

And Credence is begging, incoherent and close to sobbing as Newt works him over. When he finally pulls back Credence thinks, briefly, he may cry from the absence. His head feels heavy as lead as he looks up, punch drunk, watching Newt pour more lubricant into his cupped palm and stroking his own rosy length with it.

“Tell me if this hurts,” he grunts as he lines up. “We’ll go as slow as you need.”

Credence wants Newt in him, hitting that place that felt like a supernova in his skin. He does not want to go slow in the least.

He nods, and nearly bites his lip clear through as Newt pushes in, slow as his word promised. The stretch is still incredible, the right side of painful, maybe, each inch restrained and careful as Newt trembles above him.

“Please move,” he whimpers, when Newt has been still and splitting him in half for several long moments.

Newt rolls his hips languidly at first, shallow and slow. Credence hisses when he bucks up to meet him too quickly and the stretch burns sharp and hot before he settles back down.

“Hold on, let me take care of you. You don’t have to --” Newt groans as Credence drags his nails down the planes of his back, searching for an anchor to hold onto as Newt hits that perfect place again. “Tell me what you want, you don’t have to do anything, I’ll take -- take care of it,” he finishes, breathless.

“ _More_ , please, please, I w-- _faster_.”

Newt buries his face in the side of Credence’s neck as he speeds up, and Credence nearly chokes on the feeling of being so close, so full, so, so, so _close_.

It’s a sweet tightness, nearly the same as he’s used to, that buds warm and low as Newt grinds into him, his own rhythm faltering as Credence fumbles to keep up, to try and make Newt feel as good as he does, if that’s even possible. Newt arches under his nails against his back, shudders when Credence sucks and nibbles along the line of his jugular, and when he winds a hand in his sweaty hair to tug, Newt freezes above him, taut as a bowstring, just as Credence tumbles off of the ledge of his release.

They are uncomfortably hot and sweaty plastered together, but if that bothers him any, Newt still doesn’t move for some time.

Credence feels raw and tender when he does pulls out, unable to bite back a cry when Newt’s gone from him and it’s a gaping emptiness where Credence feels Newt should be now, preferably always.

He fumbles half off the edge of the bed and cleans Credence off, half-assed, with his own sweater.

“Probably gross,” Credence says weakly. His eyes are making every effort not to open.

“...Probably?” Newt rasps.

“Don’t know anything for sure right now,” he mumbles, trying to reach for Newt’s warm body. It is too hot to draw him close, but Credence won’t believe anything is real until he feels his sweat sticky skin underneath his hand in some way.

Newt catches his hand with his own, clumsy and pruning oddly soft from the lube. Maybe that is gross, but Credence really doesn’t know anything for sure, except when Newt kisses his knuckles it feels like he is smiling.

III.

Credence wakes to midmorning shining through Newt’s blinds. Newt is awake beside him, groggy and tousled, his fingers unbearably gentle tracing the swoop of Credence’s cheekbone, the scratch of stubble at his jaw, his parted mouth.

It is enough for Credence to flirt with sleep again, his body a warm stretch as he nuzzles close.

“I love you,” he says softly, the pad of Newt’s thumb tracing over his eyebrow.

Newt tastes like sleep-skin when he presses their lips together, soft and easy. He hasn’t had coffee, and even if it is nearly eleven thirty he is nonverbal and not quite awake, perhaps shy of being alive. It doesn’t matter, to Credence. He is content to relive the night before in the gentle quiet of Newt’s bedroom, his muscles remembering their stretch and closeness as he leaves the last dregs of sleep behind him. If he tries, Credence can feel Newt’s hands on him all over again, real as the ones warm and dry resting on his chest now.

His stomach grumbles.

Newt is smiling into his pillow as Credence rolls out of the bed, wobbling on his feet. He starts Newt’s coffee in the kitchen and digs through the cabinets for something to eat. Newt has clearly tried to put more food in the house, and Credence wonders if, maybe, he should try for more than the cereal he ends up grabbing for.

But Newt nuzzles the nape of his neck as he reaches for the beeping coffee maker, and Credence thinks there will be other times, more time, for that. Later.

Credence will let himself think like that, this morning.

He carries both bowls of Cheerios to the living room as Newt pads behind him, taking up his spot on the couch.

“Sit up here with me,” he rasps, patting the space beside him. Credence does, tucking himself under Newt’s arm. He finishes the entire pot of coffee before he reaches for his cereal, right as Credence is tipping the bowl back to finish the milk in his.

“We are naked on your couch,” he says after a minute.

“Are you cold?”

Newt puts the bowl aside, reaching over him to grab the soft, fleecey blanket from the back of the couch. He is grinning like he is enjoying himself a bit too much, tucking it around Credence like a burrito.

“How are you feeling, love?”

Credence wiggles so Newt can get his arms around him again. “Good.” He wrestles his arm free to stroke at the hair on Newt’s chest and belly. “Uhm. How are you?”

Newt smiles into his hair. “Oh, you know. Buoyant. Incredible. Superb.” He kisses the top of Credence’s head. “I suppose I’m good.”

He melts underneath Newt’s attention. He doesn’t think Newt could feel half as good as he himself does, that would be impossible -- but Newt enjoyed himself. Maybe part of that was even Credence, making Newt feel good.

“...I want to take you to bed again,” Newt says lowly, as Credence watches snow pile up further in the window panes. “I --”

“Yes.”

Newt snorts. “You don’t know what I was about to say.”

“I don’t care.”

“Alright then, don’t get your presents,” Newt chuckles. Credence swings his leg over to straddle Newt’s lap.

“Can I ask you for something I want?”

Newt kisses at the juncture of his ear and jaw. “I hope you do.”

“Tell me again.”

He is smiling with all his teeth as he kisses the side of Credence’s mouth. “I love you.” A kiss on his Adam’s apple. “I love you.” His hands squeezing at Credence’s rear. “I love you.” His mouth warm and open speaking directly into his chest. “I love you.”

Credence has to muster all his self-control to stand, but it’s worth it when Newt takes his hand to follow.

He intends to make it to the shower; it’s even running and pluming steam in the bathroom when Newt presses him to the tiled wall and busies himself licking along the line of his collarbone, his hand warm and perfect gripping his length.

Credence cracks his head on the wall arching back into it, and he and Newt both giggle breathlessly as Newt cups the back of his head, kissing his temple.

“Sorry, darling.”

Newt’s mouth tastes like coffee but Credence doesn’t mind it, because Newt is kissing him slow and nipping at his lip like he has all the time in the world to draw this out, just because he wants to.

“Can I ask for something else?”

He smiles into Credence’s mouth. Credence takes that as a yes, and he pulls back to kneel in front of Newt, because this is one of his favorite things in the world to feel him in his mouth, heavy on his tongue, his smell everywhere and so close. Credence hums around the thickness stretching his lips wide, his mind blank and blissfully quiet.

Newt is not, panting and mewling and rolling his hips just shallowly enough for Credence to think it’s edging towards too much. If there is finesse Credence can learn to make this better for him, Newt pulls away before Credence gets much in the way of opportunity.

“I’m sorry in advance.”

Credence has no idea what Newt could possibly be talking about, but then he is being pushed backwards on the floor, Newt heavy on top of him, pinning his wrists and grinding his hips down mercilessly.

“Alright?”

“Hold -- can you hold me down...more, please?”

Newt groans into the side of his neck and puts more weight down on his wrists held above his head, his knee prying his legs apart. Credence keens into the delicious weight. Perfect, perfect, good.

His release takes him off guard when it comes, sudden and warm and leaving him boneless and perhaps permanently incoherent. He tries to keep up with Newt, after, but his body is useless, not that this seems to do anything but drive Newt further, harder. Beside him, Credence can feel the water gone cold in the shower when Newt finally shudders above him, ribboning Credence’s chest with his spend.

He slumps next to Credence, chest heaving.

“If you need to go to the chiropractor for your back,” he pants after a moment, staring at the ceiling, “I’ll pay for it.”

“I know.”

He can’t help from wincing as he clambers up to turn the shower off, but it’s not all bad soreness. Credence offers his hand to help Newt up before grabbing for a washcloth to wipe himself clean.

“I’m amazed you’re able to walk around so easy.” He sounds a bit sheepish, and he’s studying Credence like he’s trying to spot an injury. “I didn’t -- mean to go so hard on you, I’m sorry.”

Credence looks at Newt through his lashes before he takes the cloth to his skin.

“I’m not as old as you are.”

“I am going to make you pay for that.”

There is sharp, hot interest coming alive in his belly, heedless of the rest of his uncooperative body, as he imagines any or all of the ways Newt’s promise could play out. He’d seen some things when doing his googling, before, but had no idea how to bring them up with Newt.

“What are you thinking about, love?”

...Later. He would bring them up later.

*

They shower, eventually. The water is like ice when they step out, Newt’s mouth red and swollen and Credence wobbling on his feet and hardly able to believe himself or the past twenty minutes of his life. They fall back into bed immediately after, sleep only between touching each other, talking about nothing only in that dreamy space between waking and darkness, and to Credence’s delight their day and into the evening is eaten up doing only these things exclusively.

Credence wakes the next day to Newt’s slick fingers scissoring him open. This time Credence buries his face in the pillows and lets Newt hold his hips up while he sets a punishing pace from behind, pushing Credence close to screaming. After, Newt lays heavy over Credence’s back, kissing the tender bite-mark he’d left on his shoulder, and it’s only when they’ve caught their breath does he mention the gifts.

It’s well past one in the afternoon when they make it to the living room. Newt orders pizza, scratching absently at his bare chest, his sweatpants slung low. Credence has wrapped himself in Newt’s housecoat and is curled on the couch, in theory watching the Animal Planet, in practice watching the light halo around Newt in the kitchen.

Credence is happy. He has rarely if maybe ever felt something so simple and so plainly.

Once Newt plops onto the couch next to him, Credence allows him to drag his cold feet into his lap and run his thumb along the instep. Newt’s bare shoulders, his chest, the thick column of his neck, are splotched with bruises of Credence’s making in varying sizes and stages of healing. He can see red scratchmarks curving around one of Newt’s shoulders, and on his bottom lip is a small nick from Credence biting down on it too hard.

It is odd, to think about treating a body he loves so roughly, to presume possession of any sort over it to touch it, by and large, however Credence likes, and just because he likes it, and wants to. His own body is marked much the same, when he looks down to it. For once, maybe, Credence feels like they are a matching set. It is more than Credence ever thought he could hope for.

Newt is Good, and Credence tries very hard to be worth that, and all the kindness and gifts that come alongside. He stares at a purpling bruise on Newt's left nipple and thinks that the single best thing Newt ever gave him was that freedom to try, and to learn. The space to love him, to learn how, and even to be happy, the two of them, together.

“My love? Are you with me?”

Newt is holding a wrapped box in his hands, looking impossibly shy after everything.

A gift. Newt likes giving them. Credence likes accepting them.

Credence is smiling when he reaches for the box.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Content Warnings: a happy ending (if you _know_ what I _mean_ ;p) 
> 
> Well...here it is. :')
> 
> I can't tell you how much I appreciate all the support, patience, and feedback everyone has given me this far. I hope you enjoyed this fic in one way or another. <3 
> 
> If you like, you can keep up with me on [tumblr](http://violetteacup.tumblr.com). I have a little one shot sequel planned out for this story, and I'll be sure to post on there when that's up. 
> 
> Also, if you found this in any way enjoyable or want to help me improve as a writer, I am looking for a few new betas, if you want to be the first ones burdened with my drafts ;p You can message me on tumblr with questions, if you have them.
> 
> Thanks so much, again. :) I'll be seeing ya!


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